Secrets of the Sohma
by Aishuu
Summary: As Sohma Momo ages, she begins to discover the truth about her family her cousin Haru begins to drop hints which will lead her to the dark secret her mother has forgotten and her father hides: Momiji. COMPLETE.
1. Whispers

Aishuu Offers:  
Secrets of the Sohma   
Mbsilvana@yahoo.com  
Disclaimers: Fruits Baskets is most assuredly not mine. It belongs to Takaya Natsuki.  
Credits: This has been brewing since I wrote "Smile," a Momiji piece... I wanted to do an in-depth piece on Momo... Two other Momo oneshots deserve credit for inspiring me to actually GO with this: One is Xandra's "Family Matters," and the other one is "I Have a Secret" by maeyan, which actually came out while I was writing this... but it helped me keep motivated. It seems everyone sees Momo as one of the great Sohma secrets.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~  
Part One: Whispers  
~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
When I was thirteen, I first became aware of how exceptionally beautiful and entrancing my cousins were.   
  
It sounds odd that I never realized that before, but... it never was a consideration for me. I was a member of a large clan, and though my father was important to them, I was not. My mother seemed to be despised for some reason, and this hatred was carried onto me.   
  
A young child's heart sees more clearly then the mind of an adult.   
  
Still, I was always used to having my multitude of family swirl around, with me, always, but not quite, being a part of them. I bore the name Sohma, but was not one of them. I didn't know why, but I didn't let it worry me. I was beautiful and popular with my classmates, and people who met me adored me on sight. Then... I started to grow up, and when that happened, the girls in my class grew with me.   
It is natural enough, I suppose, to have a crush on the relatives of your friends. They are safe to practice on, since there's little chance of anything developing, and they usually have a sense of familiarity. That wasn't exactly the case with my friends, but it's the principle of the matter.   
  
It was family day when it began. I had just entered middle school, and was nervous. Mama was back in Germany visiting her family, and Papa had promised to attend, but he had received a call from one of the business branches in Kyoto. I had assured him that I had friends I could spend the day with, which was the truth, but I still felt lonely.   
  
I walked into the school, and smiled at my classmates. Some of them had their families with them already, and others were waiting for their parents to arrive. I was the only one who was going to be alone. It was not...   
  
A tap on my shoulder interrupted my brooding, and I spun around, expecting either Hisae or Nakuru, my two closest friends. To my surprise, a pair of sky blue eyes stared into mine, looking at me with curiosity. "Momo-chan?" the woman said, and I blinked for a moment before I recognized her.   
  
The small woman standing in front of me had just become engaged to one of my cousins, and was due to marry him in a year or so. In fact, he was standing next to her, and his lavender eyes were looking at me guardedly. There was no love or affection present, just something... watchful.   
  
"Honda-san!" I exclaimed, and I wondered if something was wrong with my father.   
  
She smiled at me, and it was like the sun had forced its way through the clouds. "Your father couldn't come, so we came in his place. Since Yuki is acting Clan Head, we figured it'd be acceptable... if it's okay with you?" she asked, and her voice grew concerned.   
  
I blinked, unable to believe what I was hearing. I didn't understand clan politics, but I knew that Yuki was currently the most important member of the clan until a new head was appointed. It had been two years since Sohma Akito had died, but no one seemed to be in a hurry to replace him. I didn't see why they just didn't make Yuki the permanent Clan Head, but father told me things didn't work like that. "I- I'd like that..." I answered.   
  
Her smile grew wider, and Yuki nodded. "I'll get the others," he said, and he moved to the hall.   
  
"Others?" I echoed.   
  
"Well... Since your father couldn't make it, we thought it'd be better to have more of your cousins in his place. That way you wouldn't be so lonely," she explained.   
  
I watched in amazement as Yuki reappeared moments later, leading in two other people that I knew to be important family members- Hatsuharu and Kyou. Both of them interacted quite frequently with many of the important clan members, so I was confused as to their sudden interest in me. I had seen both of them at some point, but I was surprised they would come see this distant cousin they were supposed to outcast.   
  
Mama was gaijin, and so was I. It was the only reason I could think that the Sohma family hated us so.   
  
Still, Haru gave me a soft smile and looked around my class. "Oi, Yuki," he said. "Your princely nature is going to overwhelm the locals," he teased.   
  
Yuki sighed. "I thought I was done with all that when I graduated."   
  
"Well, at least they don't have time to form a fan club," Haru said, blinking silver eyes over at the clan head.   
  
"Wanna bet?" Kyou said sarcastically, arching an eyebrow towards where three of my classmates were standing.   
  
I followed his gaze, and noticed three of the girls most prone to crushes gathering to stare at my cousins. I knew that they were younger than most of the guests for family day, but I hadn't realized how outstanding they were. Yuki's silvery hair was the perfect foil to his violet eyes, and no one could ever miss Kyou's red hair and fascinating cinnamon eyes. Haru, too, was attractive in a wilder way, with his white and black hair, and his colorless clothing.  
  
I looked at my friends, and wondered exactly what they were going to do to my cousins. The love-love looks in their eyes worried me, but... I pushed it aside. For the first time in my life, members of the Sohma clan were making an attempt to accept me as one of their own, and I was going to enjoy it.   
  
"So, Momo-chan," Tohru said, cutting through my discomfort, "can you tell us a little about what's going on today?"   
  
I pulled on my fuku's skirt a little, before stealing a glance at Haru. Haru was watching me closely with half-lidded eyes, and I wondered why it felt like he was judging me for... Something important.   
  
"Well, there are going to be some events, and the third years will be putting on a play, but I wasn't going to go to that. My class is holding some races, and family members are..." I trailed off, realizing that they might not be that willing to help me.   
  
"Encouraged to participate?" Yuki said softly. "I'll-"   
  
"It's a challenge! I'll beat you!" Kyou crowed loudly, wearing a smug smile on his face and pointing a finger at Yuki.   
  
Yuki rolled his eyes. "I thought we were beyond this?"   
  
Haru's smile seemed to turn sly, and he rested a familiar hand on Yuki's shoulder; somehow, it seemed very intimate to me. "It doesn't matter, Yuki; it's not just a dog you can't teach new tricks," he said softly. "Besides," and this time, he spoke more loudly over his shoulder, "you know that there's no way you'll defeat Yuki."   
  
Kyou punched the wall he'd been standing next to, cracking the paint. For some reason, my eyes fell the simple peace beads he was wearing on his wrist. For some reason, they struck me as out of place. Kyou seemed to notice where my attention had wandered to, for the next second, his arm was down, and the long-sleeved blue shirt he was wearing was covering it. "Yuki cheats," he muttered.   
  
Tohru seemed on the verge of a panic attack. "Eto-eto!" she was saying, bouncing back and forth between the three cousins.   
  
Haru looked at the others. "They'll be fine, Tohru," he assured her. "You know it's only when they aren't fighting you need to worry."   
  
She gave me a smile. "Well, I guess they'll both play with you!" she said, smiling, and she took my hand. "Do you want to show us around the school? Or maybe introduce us to your teachers?"   
  
I nodded. "My teachers are in the next room. They're letting students bring their families in..."   
  
"Let's go," Yuki said. "Haru... Kyou..."   
  
"I'll be good," Haru promised.   
  
"I won't."   
  
"Kyou-kun," Tohru said, and her liquid blue eyes turned to him. "Kagura would be most upset if you embarrass Momo-chan."   
  
His eyes widened in horror. "You wouldn't..."   
  
"She wouldn't, but I would," Yuki said almost cheerfully.   
  
I watched the interplay carefully, like a moth circling the flame. I longed for the closeness they had, but I worried that it was going to burn me. The Kagura they were talking about must be Sohma Kagura, and apparently, the rumors of her and Kyou's relationship had been true.   
  
For years, it was well-known that Kagura had wanted Kyou, but now he apparently reciprocated... I was happy for her. I didn't really know her, but I was always happy when people found love together. "Let's go," Yuki said, dropping the playfulness of a moment before and studying me. "We'll speak to your teachers..." Something about the way he said that made me wonder if it was really such a good idea. He was Clan Head, and I knew that the Sohma Clan was powerful; if he took offense...   
  
Tohru's smile reassured me as she offered me her hand. "I can't wait to see your school! My mother loved school very much, and I liked it... I was almost sad to graduate..."   
  
"I wasn't..." the three men said in unison, and I couldn't help giggling. I tried to muffle it, but Haru just sighed.   
  
"Go ahead and laugh. If you try to keep it in, these two will drive you mad." He waved a finger between our cousins, who both gave him black looks.   
  
I gave in and burst into peals of laughter as we arrived at the door to the teachers' room. Taking a deep breath, I forced myself to find some semblance of composure before bringing in my relatives.   
  
Yuki seemed to retreat behind a mental wall of ice, while Kyou's eyes flared. Haru and Tohru both looked at me reassuringly, and I walked over to my teacher.   
  
"Sakurada-sensei?" I said, trying to get her attention. "Excuse me, but my family is here to meet you."   
  
My teacher, a woman in her mid-thirties, looked away from the small clique of teachers she was with. Her face went slack in surprise when she saw my cousins, and I could see that their sheer presence had taken her aback. "Y-yes, Momo-chan," she said. "Introduce me?" A faint blush came to her cheeks, and I wondered if she was another woman who would sign up for the Sohma Yuki Fan Club. She was only thirty, so it wasn't entirely unreasonable.   
  
"Sensei, these are my cousins, Sohma Hatsuharu, Sohma Kyou and Sohma Yuki... And Yuki's fiancée, Honda Tohru," I said. Something about the way she was staring at them made me nervous. "My father couldn't come today, so they came instead. This is Sakurada-sensei."   
  
"Feel free to call me Hoki," she said, offering her hand to Yuki, apparently enthralled.   
  
Yuki handled her masterfully, nodding his head regally, though he ignored her hand as though it was not there. "You have our thanks for taking care of our cousin," he said, and he rested a hand on my shoulder for a brief second, making me almost melt in happiness.   
  
He liked me! He called me his cousin! my thoughts screamed. I gave him a dazzling smile, and a bit of the ice he had assumed right before entering the room melted away briefly.   
  
"She's a brilliant student.... I'm sure your uncle is proud of her."   
  
Yuki smiled, and the temperature in the room seemed to drop in about ten degrees. "The relationship is more distant than that- Momo is my third cousin, Kyou's second, and I think... Haru's second as well," he said, and his voice was sharp enough to cut.   
  
"She's my fourth," Haru said. "Her father is the Sohma Shuichi of Ryu's line, not Tatsumi's."   
  
Sakurada-sensei blinked, but she was too stubborn to pull back. "That... distant?" she said. "You... must have a very large family...."   
  
"You try drawing the family tree out sometime," Kyou was arguing with Haru. "I think you and Momi- Momo... Are more closely related than that."   
  
"We number in the hundreds," Yuki told sensei as Haru was telling Kyou to shut up. "Momo-chan... Can you take us outside, so we can see some of your school, and perhaps some of what your classes are offering?" Though it was phrased as a question, I recognized the subtle command in his voice.   
  
"Hai, Yuki-oniisama!" I replied, moving for the door.   
  
Kyou laughed as I led them down the hall. "Oniisama? Wouldn't that just make Ayame-"   
  
"Shut up," Yuki said shortly.   
  
The school was bright and festive with decorations we had hung up, and as the day progressed, I gradually relaxed in their company.   
  
Yuki was distant sometimes, but there was a gentleness to his demeanor that I liked. Kyou was always on the verge of an explosion that never quite boiled to the surface, and he seemed to take a positive delight in irritating Yuki. Tohru was one of the sweetest women I had ever met, and her gentle moderation of their squabbling kept them in line with a subtle skill I couldn't help but appreciate. They were all fascinating, and people kept trying to get their attention, and I was proud to be with them.  
  
Still, it was quiet Haru I found myself drawn to. He wasn't the most beautiful -that was Yuki- or the nicest -that was Tohru, and while his appearance was wild, it was Kyou who was the outrageous one. Something about Haru, though, drew me... His silver eyes seemed to watch every move I made as though he was memorizing them. I had good instincts for people, Mama had always told me, but Haru... Confounded them.   
  
I wondered why it was like he both loved and hated me, even though he didn't know me.   
  
The celebration continued, and Yuki stood well in the stead of my father. My classmates watched me enviously as I spent time with my family, and we explored all the activities offered.   
  
It turned out neither Yuki or Kyou participated in the family races, simply because the other families sent older fathers, and neither had the heart to defeat them. I had no doubt that one of them would win. Kyou was a martial arts sensei, and something about Yuki gave the impression that he was breathtakingly competent at whatever he chose to undertake.   
  
The food that Tohru had brought for our lunch was amazingly delicious, and at that time, my classmates began to appear. Yuki acted oblivious to their clumsy flirtatious, and Kyou was impatient with them. Haru, though, flirted right back with them, giving some of them weak knees. Their parents on seeing their susceptible daughters repaid him with dark looks.   
  
I loved it. I loved being a part of the Sohma family after being apart from them for so long. Finally, though, it was time for the day to end. I walked them to the gate, and smiled at them shyly. I hated to see this day end. I bowed to them. "Thank you so much for coming here! It really meant a lot to me!"  
  
Kyou just shrugged. "Someone asked us to. You're a sweet chibi, Momo-chan... not a problem."  
  
"Kyou!" Yuki snapped sharply, and Tohru's eyes were wide.   
  
"What Kyou meant was that you're family! Anything for family!" Tohru said, smiling happily, though there was something strained to it. "We had a lot of fun!" She picked up my hands in her own and gave them a squeeze. "You need anything while your mama is away, call the main house and let us know!"  
  
She looped her arms through Yuki and Kyou's and dragged them off, interrupting our good-byes.  
  
I watched them go, feeling thoroughly confused, and I was standing again alone with Haru.   
  
He looked down into my amber eyes, and apparently he decided to say something. "You're a sweet child, Momo-chan... but we didn't do it for you.... Or for your parents. Someone close to us was worried that you'd be lonely today... and since there're reasons why they couldn't come themselves, we came in their place." He studied my face carefully, and I felt as though I had passed some sort of inspection. Then he bent low and whispered in my ear. "The Sohma family has many secrets, and many people are hurting because of them." A moment later, Haru straightened and walked off, without another word.  
  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~  
END CHAPTER ONE  
  
Notes: An in-depth Momo fic... fun. Set about five years after the series ends, so the crew is about 21 or so.  
  
The Sohma family tree... well, I've never seen a diagram, but I've assumed that it's fairly extended.  
  
Sakurada-sensei is one of the oldest in-jokes in fandom... in seems ALL shoujo fans name teachers that in honor of Takeuchi-sensei's recurring Sakurada-sensei.  
  
Thanks to Lyra and Xandra for editing.  
  
Remember, feedback is something writers like, crave, and keeps them prioritized and moving! 


	2. Penumbra

Aishuu Offers:  
Secrets of the Sohma   
Mbsilvana@yahoo.com  
Disclaimers: Fruits Baskets is most assuredly not mine. It belongs to Takaya Natsuki.  
Dedication: Ina-chan for all her help and emails, both long and contemplative, and quick and informative.  
  
Part Two: Penumbra  
  
I had a lot to think about after that.   
  
It's not the nature of a teenager to think strongly on things from a balanced perspective; we tend to think only of ourselves and how everything relates to us.... But this time, I think I was entitled to that. Haru, Yuki, Kyou and Tohru had certainly given me enough to ponder.   
  
The next day at school, I found my popularity even more overwhelming than it usually was. The girls all were begging to be invited over to my house or have me get pictures of my cousins. Even Sakurada-sensei was nicer to me, offering extra help after school, if I needed it. The idea was ridiculous, since I was one of her top students.   
  
"Momo-chan?" Hisae asked after I fended off the twentieth attempt by yet another girl to get Yuki's picture. "I..." She lowered her eyelashes, and I could see that she was about to ask the question I was learning to dread.   
  
"Not you, too!" I exclaimed. "I can't get pictures of them... I don't even have them myself!" I pointed out, sounding sharper than I had intended.   
  
"But- can't you ask? I'm sure Hatsuharu-sama and Kyou-sama aren't camera shy, and if Yuki-sama is clan head..." Nakuru was the one who chimed in this time.   
  
I gave them both death glares. "This was the first time they've ever deigned to have anything to DO with me, and now the school's making them into public property!" I tried not to pout, and I definitely tried not to think on how Nakuru, who was usually cheerfully levelheaded, was addressing my cousins as "sama."   
  
Hisae sighed, and her dark brown eyes grew dreamy. "Normally I'd side with you... But... Your cousins are just so handsome... They belong to the entire female population."   
  
"Yuki-niisama's engaged to Tohru-san," I pointed out tartly. "And Kyou-niisan is dating Kagura-neesan... And can you imagine what your parents would do if you brought Haru-niisan home?" I asked.   
  
My friends feigned a swoon. "It'd be worth it... Don't you think, Sae?" Nakuru asked.   
  
"Oh, they'd kill me, but it'd be so worth it!" Hisae agreed.   
  
"Traitors," I muttered.   
  
Hisae must have noticed that I was near my breaking point. "Will you see them again anytime soon?" she asked.  
  
I blinked at her suspiciously. "I don't live on the main compound, so unless there's some pressing reason, I won't see them until New Year's. Well... until Tohru and Yuki's wedding, and that's-"  
  
I stopped abruptly, remembering the invitation to the engagement party that had come in the mail several weeks before. Yuki and Tohru would be hosting a clan gathering that very weekend to celebrate their approaching nuptials, and though I hadn't planned on going, I could.   
  
"Yes?" Nakuru prodded.  
  
"There's a party at the compound this weekend, for Yuki-niisama and Tohru-san's engagement... I hadn't intended on going, but..." I trailed off, thinking about the possibilities.  
  
Hisae studied my pale features. "Your family really doesn't like you much, do they?"  
  
"Well, they've always isolated me before. This was the first time I've ever spoken to them, and it was... nice. I enjoyed it. The Sohma family is very large, and it's close. I always thought it was because Mama was gaijin and Papa married her without approval, but that can't be it." Hatsuharu's quiet words before he departed made me seriously doubt that, but it wasn't something I could share with my friends.  
  
It was Sohma business.  
  
"You should go," Nakuru told me, losing all her giddiness over my cousins, and reverting to the friend I had always relied on. "It's important to you to know about your family, isn't it?"  
  
"More than anything," I agreed.  
  
"If they showed up here, it must mean they are willing to talk to you," Nakuru continued logically.  
  
I nodded, but a part of me questioned that. I remembered Haru's hints of someone working behind the scenes on my behalf, and I knew that clan politics had come into play. However... who could it be? Papa was not that influential in the family. He may have owned one of the businesses, but there were many. We were a very rich family.  
  
Hisae winked at me. "Besides, even if they don't talk to you, I'm sure seeing Yuki-sama in a kimono will be worth it!" she teased.  
  
"He's my cousin!" I growled before pouncing on her, intent on inflicting light bodily damage. The three of us laughed merrily, but seeds of doubt nagged my heart.  
  
*  
  
  
I pressed my hands over the gold kimono I had selected to wear to Yuki and Tohru's engagement party. It was a very large deal, and I knew that most of the family would be coming. Papa had been surprised at my insistence that I was old enough to go, but he humored me, going so far as to purchase the new outfit.  
  
Mama had been more worried, since she wasn't fond of visiting the Main House. I had told her that I would be fine, and that I had met Tohru-san and I was sure she would be kind. "Tohru-san will be surrounded by members of the family who want to offer their congratulations. They won't pay attention to you, and Tohru will barely have time to say hello," she argued. "And I really don't want to go and face another round of alienation."   
  
I smiled at her, picking up her hands and squeezing them reassuringly. "The ones who came to my conference day at school were very kind, and Yuki-niisama was one of them. They'll follow his lead," I told her gently. "I want this, Mama."   
  
She must have seen the determination in my eyes, for she nodded slowly. "I'll help you get ready, but I'm not going," she said with stubbornness matching my own. "You need to learn what they're like on your own. I think you're old enough to see that your father's family is not..." she paused, searching for a word, "kind. I have no idea why they showed up at your school, but they had reasons of their own."   
  
I was reflective as I remembered Hatsuharu's final words to me. They had reasons, but I was sure they were good ones. "Mama, they are my family," I told her forcefully. "I am a Sohma... I want to be one of them in truth, as well as in name."   
  
Mama reached out, her arms creeping around me, and then she was embracing me more tightly than I ever remembered. "Oh, Momo," she whispered, and tears beaded on her cheeks.   
  
That was how I found myself outside the compound doors, alone. Papa was unable to come because of a meeting, and Mama had remained true to her promise not to go. The compound was so huge, and I felt so small. I shivered a bit, and wondered if I was crazy, to confront the family by myself. Still, I squared my shoulders and put my chin up, and with dainty steps, I entered.   
  
People were everywhere, and I felt lost in the sea. Everyone was so beautiful and elegant, and I felt like I was a small fish in the swirl of activity that I didn't understand.   
  
"Who's she?" I heard one of them whisper.   
  
"It's that women's child," was the spiteful reply.   
  
What was I doing there? I wondered as I felt the disdainful eyes of some of the older women swipe over me. I started to back away towards the door, hoping to make a graceful exit before too many people saw I was there. I wasn't wanted...   
  
"You're not going to let them win so easily, are you?" a quiet voice asked, and I looked over to see Hatsuharu looking down on me with those silvery eyes that didn't miss anything. His clothes were entirely black, contrasting with his white hair strikingly, and his arms were folded across his chest. The women who had been whispering swept away in confusion when they saw him begin to speak to me.  
  
"I-" I began, but was unable to lie to him. "I'm so out of place here," I said softly.   
  
"Make a place for yourself, Momo. There are those who don't want you here, but it's important that you join the clan," he informed me, coming to my side. His face was expressionless, but there was an intensity to him that I found compelling.   
  
"Why? Why are you being so kind to me? What are the secrets you hinted to me about that you seem to think I can help with?" Haru's eyes fell away from my face. "I promised not to tell." I gritted my teeth when he remained resolutely silent. "Who can tell me?" I demanded, realizing that it was futile to threaten him. He was a good foot taller than I was, thirty kilos heavier, and much more highly regarded than I could ever hope to be. I looked around at the members of the clan, trying to decide which ones would deign to talk to me.   
  
"The person who has the most right to tell you won't for fear of hurting you," he answered long after I had given up hope of him telling me anything. "Your mother doesn't even remember, and your father- he's too weak," Haru said scornfully.   
  
"Papa's not weak!" I argued. Then what he said registered. "Would that person who has the right be the one who sent you four to my school for my conferences?" I asked.   
  
Haru sighed a bit, but a look of satisfaction sparkled in his eyes. I had figured out what he wanted me to know, apparently. "I won't go into this, Momo-chan, but he is. If anyone is deserving of the clan's hate, it's your father, Sohma Mitsuru. But that doesn't matter right now. Tonight is about celebration, and if there's one thing this family does well, it's throw a party. Would you like to see Tohru and Yuki to offer your congratulations?"   
  
I perked up, relieved to get off the dark subject. Hearing my father described so negatively made me uncomfortable. "I'd like to, but I doubt I'll be able to get near them."   
  
"I'll get you in," Haru promised. He offered his hand to me, and I shyly took it. His hand was surprisingly soft, and I blushed as he guided me through the crowd to the largest house on the compound where the center of the party was.   
  
I heard the family whisper as we wove through the masses, but Haru was highly ranked. He was able to cut through them like they weren't there, and since I was beside him, I was treated with the same deference. Before I knew it, I stood before Yuki and Tohru.   
  
They were each dressed formally, though not in kimonos as I had been expecting. Yuki was wearing a Chinese-style outfit made of purple and black with elaborate embroidery, while Tohru was wearing a beautiful white and yellow creation that flowed around her like a young girl's dream. Tohru was beaming at whoever approached them with genuine happiness, but Yuki seemed more reserved. It was only when his eyes fell on his fiancée that he gentled. I hoped that someday, someone would look at me like that.   
  
"Yuki, Tohru..." Haru said quietly.   
  
Yuki's eyes narrowed a bit as they focused on my face, then he smiled at me. "Hello, Momo-chan. It's nice to see you."   
  
Tohru was less hesitant. She left Yuki's side, and flung her arms around me joyfully. "I'm so happy you came!" she said, and her sincerity was unquestionable.   
  
"I wanted to wish you both the best," I said shyly, as my arms wrapped around her in return. She was so warm, and she smelled like strawberries and spring rain. Hugging her was like embracing a warm summer's day.  
  
"That's so kind of you," she replied. Tohru pulled back a moment later, going to take Yuki's hand. Their fingers laced together with familiarity, and the loving look they exchanged spoke volumes.   
  
Haru pushed me forward, and I stood before my clan head and his intended.   
  
"Did your parents come?" Yuki asked.   
  
"Papa had to work, and Mama..." I trailed off, trying to think of a social lie, but finding myself unable to come up with one that his clear violet eyes wouldn't pierce right through.   
  
Tohru gave me a smile, rescuing me graciously. "How about you go and enjoy the party? Yuki and I have a lot of people we need to talk to, but I'd like to talk to you some more!" she said.   
  
I felt my smile bloom at her wish to have me there. "I'd like that," I said.   
  
Yuki gave me a considering look, surveying me from head to feet, then bent forward and kissed me on the cheek. "Have fun, cousin."   
  
I blushed a brilliant shade of red, and a hushed silence surrounded us as Haru led me away to a table that had been set up. There were many houses on the compound with various activities going on, but for Haru to sit with me here, after Yuki had treated me so warmly was a clear sign that I was to be acknowledged.   
  
My shunning was over.   
  
We were on the side, but had a wonderful view of what was going on. The platter in front of us was full of food, but I was too giddy to eat. My stomach was unsettled, and I wondered if I would ever calm down. I had been acknowledged after so long in front of the family by Yuki, the clan head. I was wanted, at last. It was a wonderful feeling.   
  
I grinned at Haru. "I was so nervous!" I confessed after expelling a breath I hadn't realized I had been holding onto. "I was afraid he was going to ignore me."   
  
"Yuki wouldn't do that. He's very different than Akito." His eyes darted over to where Tohru and Yuki were welcoming Sohma Hatori, the family's physician. I had never seen him, although he took care of Sohma clan members exclusively. Whenever I was sick, Papa called an expensive, but outside, expert. A small grin played on Haru's lips as he returned his attention to me. "Yuki is nice, once you get to know him."  
  
I stared at Haru as I realized that he had been in on what had happened. "You knew he was going to acknowledge me..." I accused him.   
  
"We had discussed it," Haru told me, leaning over and taking a grape off the platter. "The sins of the past aren't your fault."   
  
"I think..." I whispered, staring at my hands, "I think those sins you hinted to me were a shadow over my life."   
  
"Oh?" Haru asked, leaning forward a bit in interest.   
  
"When I was little, I was terribly shy," I told Haru. "I always clung to Mama's skirts, and I couldn't really talk that well."   
  
"I remember," Haru said, and his expression was neutral. "What changed?"  
  
"One day, when I was in fourth grade, I got a card from a secret admirer. It told me all the things they liked about me, and how they wished I would smile more often, because I had such a beautiful smile." My voice grew wistful. "I never did find out who sent it, but it really helps to know that someone admires you like that. After that, it became easier to talk. And I began to make friends, and things continued to cycle until I was suddenly the most popular girl in school."   
  
"All because of a card?"   
  
"We change people's lives without knowing, Haru- sometimes a simple word or gesture can have an enormous impact on someone, and change the course of their lives."   
  
He thought on my words for a moment. "I think I know some people like that. They change us just by existing. They're special."   
  
I nodded. "Some people are catalysts who always do it, but we all have that power." I fiddle with one of my long curls, before realizing I was doing it. It was a nervous habit of mine. "I think I was so unsure because my family hated me so much. Whenever I came to a gathering, I was ignored." I felt moisture gather in my eyes, but I refused to shed tears. I did not want pity. "I wanted so much to be a part of the family, but I could never become close to it."   
  
"The Sohma family is not all it's cracked up to be. Do you remember Akito?"   
  
I nodded. "I saw him once or twice, but he never spoke to me."   
  
"You're lucky. He was very cruel," Haru said, lost in memory, and his fingers toyed with the edge of his sleeve thoughtlessly. "Very cold and manipulative, and hard to love."   
  
"Why isn't Yuki clan head in truth?" I asked daringly. "Papa says that he's merely the interim, but I don't get it."   
  
My distant cousin entertained one of those thoughtful pauses he seemed so fond of. "You may bear the name Sohma, but you're not really one of us," he told me after a moment. "Only a real Sohma will understand. The Clan Head will be born to the position, as Yuki is to his, and I am to mine."   
  
"A real Sohma?" I echoed, feeling as though my heart was being stomped on. Haru was being kind to me, I knew, taking time to explain to me. Yuki had accepted me, I had believed, but now Haru was telling me I wasn't one of them. I was confused and injured.  
  
"Your father is one, much to his despair. Your mother will never be one. She had the chance, and it broke her." His gray eyes gained more silver, and I fell into the depths, feeling like I was drowning in ageless wisdom and secrets I couldn't understand.   
  
"Haru... They don't hate me and Mama because we're gaijin, do they?" I asked softly.   
  
He shook his head. "There's been others who married into the family, Momo. Your mother did something that cannot be forgiven," he replied, and his voice was just as low as mine.   
  
We watched the other members of the family move towards Yuki, and I watched as he spoke to them. Tohru was by his side, and there was a reverence for her from some of the members I found touching.   
  
"Everything can be forgiven," I told him, believing it with all my heart.   
  
He studied me, and I noticed how his eyes, too, went over to where Tohru stood. She was talking to one of my cousins, Kisa, waving her hands with delight, as Kisa gazed at her with adoration. Haru's eyes softened. "You sound like Tohru, a bit. But forgiveness can not be given until it is asked for, and your mother does not know to ask for it."   
  
"What did she do?" I asked. I desperately wanted to be one of those in the crowd, to join in the engagement party, rather than sitting on the sidelines. I still felt the chill in the air, and I knew that Haru had been right about me not being one of them, despite Yuki's acknowledgement. I was not to be treated cruelly anymore, but that did not mean I was to be let in on those secrets that danced around me.  
  
He considered my question carefully, and I knew he was trying to figure out how to word the answer so as not to give too much away. "She was selfish. She seized her own happiness at the expense of another."   
  
"I don't think Mama is very happy with the way the Sohma family treats her," I replied.   
  
"She's luckier than she deserves," Haru said, and his eyes flashed, and I realized that the gentleness I had seen in him was fading away. His face was becoming wild, and I was afraid of him suddenly. Haru was transforming before my eyes into something frightening.  
  
"Haru," I said, pulling back a bit. I didn't know what else to do, and I had the feeling that no one else would rescue me should he lose complete control of the temper I could see rising in his quicksilver eyes.  
  
"If I had my way, she'd be dead." He smiled wickedly, and leaned in close to me. "She should be grateful that being ignored is all she gets. The Sohma family isn't -"   
  
"Haru!" a voice snapped. We both turned in unison to see Kyou standing there, with Kagura next to him. Kyou had a vein pulsing at his temple, and Kagura wore a look of long-suffering exasperation.   
  
Kagura came over to me and patted me on the shoulder. "You'd better step back," she warned. "This could get ugly."   
  
And it did, but not in the way she was anticipating. It got uglier than any of us could have foreseen.   
  
"What? I'm merely telling the princess some home truths," he snapped, and he rose to his feet, glaring at Kyou. I curled up a bit inside, but Kagura held onto my shoulder, preventing me from retreating. I had to watch; for once, I was a pivotal part of the family, but not the way I wanted to be.   
  
"Don't take anything Haru says too seriously right now," Kagura whispered to me. "He has a bit of a split personality... We call him 'Black Haru' when he loses his temper. He hardly remembers it, and it's not the real him. I wonder what triggered it, though. Kyou wasn't around, and I don't see anyone else who tends to inflame him..." She gave me a curious glance.   
  
"We were talking about my mother," I confessed. I wondered if Kagura hated her, too. I had only met Kagura a handful of times, but she had always seemed nice enough.  
  
"Ah." That one syllable was layered with emotion, and Kagura seemed to shut a piece of herself off.   
  
Meanwhile, Kyou and Haru were escalating. Haru was leaning menacingly close to Kyou, and ranting incoherently. Kyou wasn't much better, yelling about childhood incidents, and how Haru was nowhere near Yuki's level, so not even to bother trying to fighting. Finally, Haru pushed what must have been the last trigger. "Well, it doesn't matter that you're a professional martial artist! Yuki still ties you into knots without trying!"  
  
Combustion.   
  
Kyou exploded into action, and Haru laughed wildly, parrying the blow easily. I gasped, raising a hand to cover my mouth, but Kagura just sighed. "Don't worry. If it gets bad enough, Yuki will separate them." I glanced over at the slender man who served as our clan head, and wondered if he could really manage the two wild combatants. The concern in my eyes must have been vivid, because Kagura laughed. "Don't worry! Yun-chan can tie them both up with one hand behind his back!" she said, and she giggled a bit.   
  
I over at Yuki again, and this time he met my eyes briefly. A glimmer of something in those misty lavender depths sent shivers through me, and I didn't doubt Kagura was right. "Why are they fighting?" I asked.   
  
"It's a long story, but I like to blame it on pride. Or hierarchy. Haru's ranked higher in the family than Kyou, but Kyou's the better fighter. It's a bit of a balancing act so they can be friends." She watched them fight, and growled when Haru tried to bite Kyou. "FOUL!" she yelled.   
  
I blinked a bit. They were insane. I couldn't believe I was related to them. I watched as Kyou's foot raced for Haru's face, feeling like I was watching a martial art's drama. Then it clicked, and I started to laugh. "You're such hams," I told them. "You're trying to distract me..."   
  
Haru smiled slightly as he ducked a punch from Kyou. "I'm not, but Kyou certainly is. I think you're old enough to confront some pain. The others...." He glared fiercely at Kyou, who moved over to stand in front of me, as though to protect me from Haru.   
  
"She doesn't deserve it," Kyou retorted. "She doesn't need to bear any suffering. Let her, at least, be innocent. She's a child."   
  
"So was he!" Haru snapped. Dead silence met Haru's explosive statement, and Kagura's hand fell away from me.   
  
I felt myself pale and I started to shake as Haru's hints about something terrible in my mother's past gelled. "He?" I whispered. "My mother... did something to a child?"   
  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~  
END CHAPTER TWO  
  
Notes: This is an informal family celebration - just something I figured the Sohma clan would do. It's not based off any element of the Japanese culture, but the Sohma defy a lot of Japanese culture. I decided not to have Yuki and Tohru wear kimonos, since there will be other celebrations that do follow proper Japanese procedure. Oh, and the dress Tohru wears is an Ayame creation. ^_^  
  
We see the Sohma compound in episode 8 of the anime. I'm playing it that the party is ALL over the compound, but that Yuki and Tohru are in the main house. Only the highly ranked members (the Jyunishi and those they invite) would be allowed to linger here, while everyone comes in, offers their best wishes, and get out!  
  
Penumbra has four definitions (I checked because it's such a cool word - originally this chapter was going to be called "Hatsuharu" but it took a direction I hadn't anticipated so it needed to be renamed!). The ones I feel apply are:   
A partial shadow, as in an eclipse, between regions of complete shadow and complete illumination.  
An area in which something exists to a lesser or uncertain degree.  
An outlying surrounding region; a periphery.  
  
Thanks to Lyra for the edit.  
  
Remember, feedback is something writers like, crave, and keeps them prioritized and moving! 


	3. Cousins

Aishuu Offers:  
Secrets of the Sohma   
Mbsilvana@yahoo.com  
Disclaimers: Fruits Baskets is most assuredly not mine. It belongs to Takaya Natsuki.  
Dedication: For those who email. For Serena B. and Jennifer of hatsuyume.net, for taking that extra moment to email me personally about this. It's so nice to hear from people. Also, thanks to Mona and Sarah-chan of the YukiruML. ^_^  
  
Part Two: Cousins  
  
My three older cousins stared at me in horror, and I knew I was on the right track. "My mother would never hurt a child..."   
  
Haru seemed to grow even darker, and that explosive temper of his turned towards me. "Never say never," he lashed out. I stood my ground.   
  
"I-" I started to say, but luckily I was interrupted. I really had no clue what to do.  
  
"Leave her alone, jerk!" Kyou growled, and he leapt on Haru, leveling a sharp blow at the white-haired man's stomach. Haru managed to avoid most of it, but he still went stumbling back into a table from the glancing blow.   
  
I watched them with only half my attention, trying to the spinning in my head under control. The Sohma family was...   
  
"Kyou, Haru... You shouldn't be fighting," a light voice scolded playfully. It was like a fire getting water thrown on top of it. The violence ceased as all heads turned to the latest arrival. "This is Yuki and Tohru's engagement party, and it's not fair to disrupt it."   
  
I studied the newcomer for a moment, trying to place him. I had seen him around, and I knew he was one of the cousins. His name came to me after a moment - Sohma Momiji. His soft blonde hair and gold eyes made him look as gaijin as I, though I knew he, too, was one of the inner circle. He always had a smile ready for any who crossed his path, though he never really talked to me. Yuki's acceptance had made a large difference, if Momiji had crawled out of the woodwork.   
  
Kyou seemed properly chastised, but Haru's eyes glimmered with something dark and deadly as they swept over the four of us. There was a satisfaction as they settled on Momiji's slight form. Momiji met his eyes squarely, and for a second, a hardness came into the golden boy's face before it fled. "We were merely playing," Haru said, his voice a purr.   
  
"Tohru wouldn't see it like that," Momiji said, and there was a tick in one of his eyes, even though his smile was sweet. "Yuki's looking this way," he added softly, and though the words were innocent, the threat was implied.   
  
Haru laughed lightly at that, and I knew that the "Black" Kagura had spoken of was still in control. "Well, I'll just have to go somewhere Yuki isn't, then, won't I?" he mused. "Too bad... He's beautiful when he's angry." He turned to Momiji. "You'll need to watch over Momo, since I'm not quite sane enough to at the moment. And walk her home... You know where she lives. Ja ne!" Haru said casually, vanishing into the shadows,   
  
Kagura's jaw dropped and I heard Kyou start to swear under his breath.   
  
Momiji, though, seemed resigned. "He cornered us," he said. "He played us all like instruments." He turned and gave me the wonderful smile he was so well known for. "Well, it looks like we'll be spending some time together. How about we leave Kyou and Kagura so they can have some private time, and get something to eat?" he suggested to me.   
  
I looked at him, wondering if he'd be able to answer some of my questions... Or even if he was my secret benefactor. He was tightly bound to the cousins who had shown up to my school, and he was one of the inner circle. Then I dismissed the thought, for there was no reason for Momiji not to join me, if he so desired. Momiji was like the wind, untamable and free. He went where he chose, and no one could cage him.   
  
"I'd like that," I told him.   
  
Kyou and Kagura watched like hawks as Momiji offered me a hand.   
  
"Let's go, Momo-chan!" His hand was warmer than Haru's, and his fingers slenderer. He was slight, and though his features were delicate, the androgynous quality to him was lost when he tilted his head as he considered which way to go. Purposeful, and too self-assured to be a woman, I thought. Old stereotypes held fast in my mind. "The party will get louder in here before it gets quieter. We can go to Hari's house, for one of the quieter gatherings; the food will be just as good. I think Yuki will probably be quite cranky before it's all over. He doesn't like a lot of fuss."   
  
"He shouldn't have accepted the clan head's position, then, should he?" I replied pertly.   
  
Momiji laughed at me. "Yuki didn't have a choice. Believe me, if he did, he'd be as far away as he possibly could, probably buried in some botany course in a college. But he didn't."   
  
He led me outside, and we started to move between buildings. The night sky overhead was full of stars, and I tilted my head back, trying to memorize the moment. "I don't get how the family works," I said softly. "Haru keeps dropping these hints about Mama doing-"   
  
Momiji pulled up short, forcing me to stop beside him. No one was around, but I still felt safe besides this strange cousin of mine who was regarding me with a concerned stare. "Haru is doing what he thinks is best, but he doesn't understand. For him, things are black and white, right or wrong. Your mother may or may not have done something wrong a long time ago; that really doesn't matter. What matters is that no one else gets hurt. Haru's trying to help someone he loves, but he has forgotten that he'll hurt what that person cherishes most."   
  
"Haru's not a bad person," I said.   
  
"No. He's a wonderful one. So is your mother, but good people make mistakes." Momiji cupped my face between his hands, and I realized that he was another of my beautiful cousins, one that entranced as easily as he breathed. When he smiled down on me then, it felt like being bathed in warm sunlight. "Don't search for things which will hurt you, Momo-chan. Just be happy - that's the greatest gift anyone can have, and probably the rarest for a Sohma."   
  
I wondered what all the sorrow was that everyone hinted at. It seemed odd that Momiji, too, was affected by this, for he seemed like a person full of laughter and light. But there was sadness in his eyes, and the loneliness that tinted his expression made me long to embrace him... but I did not. He was a stranger, for all that we were both named Sohma.   
  
"I find happiness in truth," I told him. "Even though there may be sorrow there, ignorance is not bliss."   
  
Momiji's hands shook a bit against the delicate skin of my cheeks. "Oh, Momo..."he said, and his voice trembled slightly, and it seemed as though he was on the verge of tears.   
  
"Shall we go?" I asked, pressing my right hand against one of his as our eyes met.   
  
He nodded, and I heard him take a deep breath to regain his composure. "Hari is having a small get together... you'll like it there a bit better. It'll be less overwhelming," he promised. I smiled at his concern.   
  
"You're being very nice to me," I said.   
  
He just laughed, and took my hand, tugging me along behind him playfully. Together we trotted off together, and soon we were in front of the doctor's house. I stared a bit, amazed that I was to be invited to this private celebration. "Come on," Momiji said. "You're among friends," he promised.   
  
He kicked off his shoes with familiarity, but I followed more cautiously. The house was dark, and I could hear the low murmur of voices, spaced with the occasional ringing laughter of one, which echoed through the house. Entering the main room behind my guide, I saw two women and four men already there. One was Hatori, of course. The other two older men I had often with him, Sohma Ayame and Sohma Shigure. The youngest man, a boy still, really, was one I had only heard of by reputation, Sohma Hiro.   
  
Hiro was a junior in high school, and I had always heard the whispers that followed him. He was frighteningly talented and intelligent, and didn't suffer fools and showed little mercy for those who were less than he was; the problem was, most people couldn't match his abilities. Many of my teachers had taught him, and they had been terrified that I would prove to be "his" kind of Sohma... When I turned out to be sweet, they made comments that I was kind as Sohma Kisa. Who happened to be sitting beside him.   
  
I watched as Hiro handed her a drink, and the tenderness in his eyes made me re-evaluate what I had been told about him. He wasn't the one-dimensional terror that people had painted him.   
  
The last woman I didn't recognize, but she was sitting on the edge of the group, near Ayame, watching them with fascination. I didn't blame her, for I felt like I could sit and stare at them for hours without being bored.   
  
"Hey, Momiji!" Ayame said, bounding to his feet. "Wasn't my ototo just the-" he began, then abruptly stopped as he saw me. "Oh."   
  
The others looked over to see what had made the notoriously unashamed Ayame stop dead in his tracks. I blushed, but forced myself not to shrink behind Momiji. "Konban wa," I said softly, bowing deeply with respect. "Momiji-niisan said that it'd be okay for me to join you here... I felt a little lost up at the main house." If anything, my words added a deeper chill.   
  
The others paused, freezing, and I wondered if I had already offended them. "It's odd to think of Momiji as a niisan," Shigure said, breaking the silence. "We all call him chan or kun, regardless of age."   
  
I looked over at the Momiji, who was regarding me sorrowfully. I had already made a misstep, hurting him unknowingly. Things were getting curiouser and curiouser, but not anything I had wanted to do to someone who was so kind. "I'm sorry..." I apologized.   
  
"There was no way you could have known," Momiji told me, smiling with ready forgiveness. "I'm just not anyone's niisan."   
  
Silence, then Ayame let loose a cackle that was fit to shatter glass. "Oh ho ho ho!" he roared. "Let's not dwell on grim matters!" He moved so quickly it was as though he teleported. "You're a beautiful girl, almost as beautiful as I am!"  
  
"She is!" the woman I didn't know said, popping up next to Ayame. "She has such gorgeous hair, and her figure is perfect! And that face!"   
  
I was used to compliments, but something about this pair made me feel distinctly as though I should be running for safety. "Um, thanks..."   
  
"You should stop by our shop sometime! For a lovely jewel such as yourself, the proper setting will enhance your beauty!" Ayame pronounced. "I think... rose. And maybe a turquoise, to contrast your lovely eyes."   
  
The woman was surveying me. "Soft shades for a young girl, anata?"   
  
"Indeed! Pastels to enhance the fair flower of a young girl! You are indeed the match of my heart to read my thoughts so well, anata!" They laughed together, and I just smiled at them, half-wishing they'd back off, and half entertained.   
  
"You're either very tactful or very stupid," a clear voice said, and I knew it was Hiro, finally adding his two cents.   
  
"Hiro!" three people snapped.   
  
The young man shrugged. "So? She's putting up with Ayame and Mine's mad plans. What am I supposed to think?"   
  
"You're supposed to think that she has manners," Hatori said. Hatori leveled a look on Hiro, but the teenager was undaunted.   
  
"She's a pushover."   
  
I blushed brightly, but I knew not to take him to heart. "I'd rather be a pushover than someone who doesn't care for others feelings," I said serenely.   
  
I glanced over at Momiji. "You said there was food? I haven't eaten today." Everyone gaped a bit at me before exploding into laughter.   
  
Hiro stared at me for a moment, his eyes narrowed, but then I thought a glimpse of approval shone in them. Kisa studied me quietly as well, but the others just laughed. I found Momiji's laughter rising in musical counterpoint to Ayame's ringing sounds, and Shigure just howled. Even Hatori spared me a small smile.   
  
"You had that coming for a while!" Shigure said, waving a finger at Hiro. "And that a middle school student puts you in your place... Oh, when I tell Kyou, he'll be so sorry he missed it!"   
  
Hiro hmphed. "Well, least I don't get it daily from everyone! Unlike someone I can name," he retaliated, meeting Shigure's eyes and making the barb quite clearly directed.   
  
"You're so cruel, Hiro!" Shigure wailed.   
  
"Come on, let's get you that food you wanted," Momiji said, tapping me on the shoulder and leading me away. "This just will go on and on..." He led me away. We came back after finding the kitchen full of delicacies, and he seated me beside him. I noticed how a few of the others' eyes lingered on me for a moment. They were obviously close, and I was intruding.   
  
Momiji had brought a stranger in.   
  
Then Momiji touched my hand to get my attention. "How have you been doing at school? Haru told us about your conference, but I'd like to hear your side of it. I bet you just about died of embarrassment when Yuki and Kyou started arguing at lunch..."   
  
Everyone turned curious eyes on me, and I suddenly realized that their interest in me was sincere. Whatever had been keeping me out... the child my mother had done something to... was not my fault. I resolved to find out about it later, but at that moment, I only wanted to enjoy the party.   
  
The party was splendid. Ayame was wild and entertaining, though occasional pithy comments from Hatori kept him in check. Mine and Shigure encouraged him, while Hiro added to the chaos by insulting everyone except for Kisa with abandon. As the night wore on, more people dropped in. Stammering Ritsu and his mother, both of whom seemed to be competing in apologizing for whatever went wrong. Beautiful Rin, and silent Kureno, who seemed to be keeping her company. Kyou and Kagura showed up shortly after.   
  
"We're almost all here," Shigure said in satisfaction. "Yuki will be late, of course... But where's Haru?"   
  
"He went black," Kagura said. "He's probably picking a fight with someone."   
  
"Ah," Shigure murmured, understanding.   
  
I glanced around, wondering why this group was the core of the family's power. I knew that to be the case, for when Yuki arrived (as Shigure implied he would be) the inner circle of the Sohmas would be complete. They had little in common, and aside from Yuki and Ayame, were not from the same branches.   
  
Momiji yawned. "I don't want to wait for Yuki," he said. "He's going to have to hold court most of the evening."   
  
"It's polite," Hatori told him.   
  
"I need to take Momo home," he said. His eyes seemed to be gaining stress lines. "Unless one of you wants to?"   
  
They all stared him down, and he pulled into himself.   
  
I decided to come to his rescue. "I can go by myself - I came here that way, and I don't need an escort home."   
  
They all shifted their eyes over to me. "It's dangerous for a girl to go out alone," Rin snapped. "He's taking you - you're his responsibility!"   
  
"Rin!" Kyou snapped.   
  
"I-" Rin rose to her feet, clenching her fists as her sharp green eyes glared at Kyou with dislike.   
  
"It would be best if Momiji took her home," a smooth voice said from the door, and all argument ceased.   
  
"Is your party done, Yuki?" Shigure asked.   
  
"No, but I had had just about enough," he said, and he walked into the room with Tohru at his side. Her cheeks were glowing with good cheer and health, but there was a tiredness to Yuki that seemed out of place. I could tell he was an introvert, and wanted nothing more than to snatch Tohru away for some quality time alone. Still, he was the clan head, and knew his duty.   
  
"You knew you wanted to see your splendid brother, you mean!" Ayame said, coming to his feet and over to Yuki's side with the speed of a striking serpent. "You want some wedding night advice that only I can give! Let me tell you about what Mine and I-"   
  
Yuki's sour expression spoke volumes. "Curl up and die," he ordered in a voice which wouldn't have melted butter.   
  
"Oh ho ho! One of these days I might take you seriously!" Ayame said, laughing.   
  
"One of these days, I hope you do," Yuki said, and the smile he gave turned my blood to ice water. Apparently, being clan head required a certain nasty streak that hadn't died with Akito.   
  
Ayame apparently decided to turn his attention to Tohru, placing a hand on her shoulder. "Well, he's in a bit of a foul mood... But when he sees what I've designed for you to wear on your wedding night -"   
  
POW!   
  
We all watched Yuki deliver a smooth kick to his older brother's chin, sending him flying across the room. I stared in amazement.   
  
Shigure rolled his eyes in exasperation, and I realized that this must have been a common occurrence. "You two are not poster children for sibling bonding," he said, watching as Ritsu stumbled over to Ayame, uttering sincere apologies. "Rit-chan, it's not your fault."   
  
"Sohmas seem incapable of a normal sibling relationship," Yuki said bluntly. "Besides, would you want.. that... as your older brother?"   
  
Momiji squirmed a bit. "You're lucky to have the chance."   
  
Yuki's eyes, which had been icy, softened a bit. "I'm sorry. How about you take Momo home? Things are going to get crazier here..." he said, and I saw his eyes land on Ayame, who was starting to sit up, "so it's no place for anyone who wants to remain sane."   
  
Momiji shut his eyes, but then his sunshine smile bloomed. "Sure thing. Come on, Momo. Let's go home."   
  
Something about the way he said that struck me as decidedly significant, but when he took my hand again, it felt like I already was home, and protected. It felt like a piece I hadn't known was missing had clicked into place.   
  
~*~*~*~*~*~  
END CHAPTER THREE  
  
Notes: Enter Momiji! A very cornered Momiji who gets manipulated into being EXACTLY where Haru thinks he should be. ^_~ Momo's starting to get a clue... next chapter will explain a bit why Momiji played along. And it'll be a bit darker.  
  
Yes, I meant to imply that sometime over the past few years Ayame got the sense to marry Mine. "Anata" and such... which would mean she'd know about the curse.  
  
For anime fans, Rin is the horse, and Kureno is the rooster - despite some reports, Akito is NOT one of the jyunishi. Darn it.  
  
Thanks to Lyra for the edit.  
  
Remember, feedback is something writers like, crave, and keeps them prioritized and moving! 


	4. Tensions

Aishuu Offers:  
Secrets of the Sohma   
Mbsilvana@yahoo.com  
Disclaimers: Fruits Baskets is most assuredly not mine. It belongs to Takaya Natsuki.  
Dedication: For Ari-neesan, just because. For Tam-chan, for becoming my newest friend. And for those who dare to correct me, like dark vampire... personally, I think Momiji's eyes are amber sometimes. Which is why they're described as golden.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
Part Four: Tensions   
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
Momiji walked in silence at my side, seemingly lost in thought, and as we got closer to my house, I noticed that his footsteps seemed to take more and more effort. Oddly enough, he didn't require directions, automatically turning off onto the small side street where my house was located.   
  
I followed him, missing the warmth of his hand when he released mine. "Would you like to come in?" I asked when we were a house down from my own. "I can serve you some tea to warm you up before you go back..."   
  
He froze momentarily, a pause so slight that I wouldn't have noticed it if I hadn't been watching his reactions so carefully. Had I made another misstep with this enigmatic Sohma? I wondered anxiously before his expression softened as he focused on my face. "Don't trouble yourself, Momo-chan... You need to get to bed. But I do need to speak to your father, so I'll come in briefly," he said hurriedly as my expression started to crumple, despite my best efforts to appear unaffected by his rejection.   
  
I felt warmth course through me, though I wondered what he needed to speak to Papa about. Well, Papa was part of the clan, and Momiji was one of the key members, so they would have reason to talk, I rationalized. We came to the door together, and I kicked off my sandals, feeling relieved to be home. Tonight had been wonderful, but trying.   
  
Momiji hesitated over the threshold, but I ignored that, waltzing in like I usually did. "Tadaima!" I called.   
  
"Okaeri!" I heard my father reply, and he stuck his head out from the living room. "Did-" he started, but he halted abruptly when he saw the company I had. "Momiji..."   
  
"Hello." Momiji said, and his voice was barely above a whisper. The young man shared a forced smile, and I could almost feel the tension between them. Again, the secrets surrounding me were nearly overwhelming, and I had no clue how to begin to unravel them. "I came to see that Momo made it home safely, and I've been meaning to speak with you."   
  
Papa nodded. "You know you're always welcome to come to me. My wife isn't home tonight - she's with friends, so..."   
  
Momiji seemed to be a bit relieved. "That's probably for the best. She's never been... good around me," he said after a moment's hesitation, a particular sorrow in his voice. I blinked, wondering what I was missing. It was getting more and more frustrating to feel like I was seeing only half the puzzle, and only in black and white when it was supposed to be solved by the view of a vast rainbow.   
  
"Can I get you something to eat?" I tried to offer. "Maybe-"   
  
Papa patted me on the head in a fashion he hadn't since I was eight. "Momo, this is going to be long and involved. You should go to bed, and if there's anything you need to know, I'll tell you in the morning," he said, and from the stern look in his eyes, I knew it was a politely worded order.   
  
I wanted to push him to let me stay, flutter my eyelashes and wheedle the way I usual did, to twist him around my fingers, but the steel in his face warned me that now was not the time to push. I sighed a bit, pouting, but I kissed his cheek like a dutiful daughter. There were other ways.   
  
"Goodnight, Papa," I said. I leaned over and kissed Momiji as well, surprised that his cheek was so warm and smooth, without a hint of stubble, even though it was very late. "It was nice to spend time with you. I'd like to do it again."   
  
He gave me a slight smile, but said nothing. My stomach twisted, and I wondered if Momiji was once again going to avoid me. It would sadden me, for I found myself drawn to him, as strongly drawn to him as I was to Hatsuharu, though the pull was different. Haru offered me answers to the mysteries that had been haunting my life, while Momiji offered warmth and sunlight.   
  
I bowed, then turned away, leaving the room. My mind was racing with my next move - it wasn't very honorable, but it was necessary if I wanted to get at the truth. Haru had told me that people were hurting because of the secrets, and I needed to shatter them, so I appeased my conscience with that balm.  
  
I was careful to climb the stairs with my usual noise before stealthily moving over to my parent's room. When I was little, I had discovered that I could see through the heating vents that were under their bed. I had to crawl under there, and it tended to be a bit dusty, but it was the perfect way to eavesdrop on what my parents were talking about in the living room, which was located directly below. I hadn't done it in a while, and I regretted the fact that I was wearing my beautiful new kimino. Still, sacrifices had to be made, I decided, as I pulled the bedspread back so I could squirm underneath.   
  
It took some maneuvering, and it was dustier than I remembered. I had to struggle not to sneeze, but as I peeked down through the slates, I could see Momiji's fair head shimmering in the low light of the room.   
  
"- of it," my cousin was saying. "It's been done, and it can't be undone."   
  
"Momiji... I haven't seen you in three months. I've been worried." My father was speaking softly, and I wished I could see his face, rather than the top of his head. His hair was still dark and rich, and I knew many of my friends thought he was too young to have a daughter as old I was, for all he was forty-five.   
  
"I've been busy. I'm an adult now," Momiji answered. I watched his hands twist around a cup, and forced myself not to mutter about how they had gotten something to drink, in spite of my offer to do it for them.   
  
"Still... three months? I wanted to know how things were with you. How is college? How are your classes? How-"   
  
Momiji cut him off. "College is fine. Classes are easy, and I'm doing well. I'm always well, you know that. I'm a survivor. I'll deal with whatever life throws me."  
  
A long silence. The tension between them was there, and I wondered how they knew each other so well, and how I hadn't known. Papa was very curious about Momiji, and my cousin seemed to be struggling to keep his distance.  
  
Momiji was the injured child, the one Mama had hurt. It was obvious... But how had she hurt him so badly that he was keeping away from a family member who obviously loved him very dearly. I had never heard Momiji's parents spoken of... perhaps he had been fostered with Papa at some time, and Mama had thrown him out? That would make sense, for the way the family treated her, but I couldn't see Mama doing that. She adored children, and often wished I wasn't an only child.   
  
"Why did you walk Momo home?"   
  
"Because they made me," Momiji replied, and his voice sounded at once guilty and glad. "Yuki and Haru have decided that I can't run anymore."   
  
My heart broke. Momiji had only spent time with me because he had been forced to, not out of a genuine desire for my company. I almost fled then, abandoning my post, but I forced myself to stay. Someone had sent Yuki and Haru to the field day first, and I was betting it was Momiji. He had to have some feeling for me.   
  
"So." My father ran a hand through his hair, and rose to his feet, walking out of my line of sight. "Is that how it's to be? The Sohmas again dancing to the tune of a master manipulator?"   
  
Momiji laughed, but it sounded strained. "I wouldn't say that. It's not about control; it's about helping someone you love. Akito never did anything because he loved us. He did it because he wanted to possess Yuki, and he delighted in dominating the rest of the Jyunishi."   
  
Jyunishi? What's that? I wondered. The only thing that came to mind was the zodiac signs, but that surely wasn't right...   
  
"Haru's doing it because he loves you," Papa was saying, and some of the anger seemed to fade from him.   
  
"I know," Momiji said, and he seemed to soften as well. His hands fell away from the cup, and he raised his face slightly, enough for me to see a soft smile playing on his face. "It makes it easier to bear, knowing that the last thing Haru wants to do is hurt me."   
  
"He'll hurt you if he thinks it's for your own good... he's not called Black Haru for nothing," Papa warned, and he stepped back into my view.   
  
"Do you love him?"   
  
Momiji blinked, then shifted upright, making me lose sight of his face. "I don't know. I don't know it I can love him the way he loves me." He sighed a bit, swirling his cup in his hand and looking at it intently, as though he could see the answers there. "Haru's had such bad luck with love - first Yuki, then Rin... Now me. I don't know why he feels compelled to always love a Jyunishi..."   
  
There was that word again, I thought.   
  
"...but I refuse to hurt him, too. He needs someone who can heal him, not shatter him. I'm damaged... I don't think I can be like Tohru, and heal the burdens of his heart, the way she did for Yuki. I can't be Kagura, and always be there, unchanging. It's not my nature to be strong."   
  
"You're stronger than you think, Momiji. It's your smile that makes people rejoice, and it's your faith that someday your wish will come true-"   
  
"Oh, SHUT UP!" Momiji yelled, and I was stunned at his ferocity. His soft voice cracked like a whip, and it would take a truly brave person to defy him. "That was when I was a child... But have you noticed? I'm an adult. That wish never came true. She never noticed... and never accepted me. She never will, and no one will ever be able to do anything about it."   
  
My father was silent for a long time. "Is that why you haven't been around? Because you can't bear to see me?"   
  
"When... Tohru and Yuki got engaged, it was everyone's wish. We were all happy - the end of our nightmare seemed here... And Hatori and Yuki have some theories. There hasn't been a child born to replace Akito yet. It's never happened before. The child should have been born two years ago, and there's been a dozen births since. We think the curse is starting to break."   
  
Curse? I wondered. They were speaking of a curse as though it was something very real to them, not something intangible and theoretical.   
  
"You're still cursed, though," Papa said, and he sounded bitter and savaged, like someone had hurt him personally.   
  
Momiji was calmer, even though he was the one they seemed to think was cursed. His anger which had been so vibrant earlier, faded as it had done before, like the tide. "I am. Perhaps that was where we were wrong, to always try shattering the curse all at once, rather than wear it away. Perhaps..." he sighed, setting aside his cup. "Yuki and Kyou don't hate each other anymore, and Kyou is no longer rejected. Haru seems to be finding his way more easily - maybe his sense of direction was part of his curse? We're all changing, for the better..."   
  
"But you've lost your hope..." Papa whispered. "That's not a change for the better. You were always the one person who we thought..."   
  
"Would manage? Would always smile?" Momiji replied. "I've been thinking a lot in the last three months. Smiles are meaningless unless they're sincere. Tohru always smiles with her heart, because she believes that things will be okay. And for her... They are. But for me..."   
  
"Momiji... I'm sorry."   
  
"Sorry gets us nowhere," he said. "You made your choices, and you asked me to make mine, when I was four. You asked a four year old to sacrifice himself for a grown woman, the woman who should have loved him."   
  
Papa came over to Momiji and knelt by his side. "I did what I thought was best, and if it was a mistake..." Papa's voice faltered. "I don't know. You were so strong, and when I said I'd love you for the both of us... I thought you would forgive me. I thought you would understand that it was the only way to save her."   
  
Momiji slid out of his seat, and knelt beside my father, taking his hands. "It is forgiven. I knew why it was done; it is part of what I am, as a Jyunishi. But it cannot be forgotten. That's the problem, do you know? The hurts of the past cannot be forgotten..."   
  
"I'm sorry... That's all I can say."   
  
"...but they can be healed," Momiji replied after a moment. "I've given up on her, but I've decided I want something else."   
  
"What? If it's mine to give, you know you just have to ask."   
  
"I want Momo."   
  
I had to cover my mouth to keep from gasping. He surely didn't mean it... THAT way, did he?   
  
"Momiji... After all this time, why?" Papa asked.   
  
"She's mine, as surely as that woman was. But Momo... may someday be able to accept what I am." Momiji's hands tightened on papa's, and I watched, feeling the power struggle between them. "Yuki and Haru are drawing her into the web of the family... I will protect her from the shadows there. Akito's influence lingers, still."   
  
"But..."   
  
"I just want to know her. She's getting entangled in our web, through her own design, and I need to know her. She'll figure it out, and it's best that she at least knows something of me, to soften the blow."   
  
I could almost feel Papa's hesitation. "I..."   
  
"She's a Sohma... it's possible that if the curse doesn't break, she may be afflicted someday, like it or not..."   
  
That seemed to decide my father. "I don't want it to happen again. I don't want to see blankness in her eyes, if she is made to forget..."   
  
"Let's not think about that." Momiji rose to his feet slowly. "I'll call you later and discuss things. I need to get back to the party - I'm sure I've been missed."   
  
"You're always missed, Momiji."   
  
"Except when I'm forgotten," he said softly. Then he headed out of sight, and I pushed myself from under the bed, covered with dust bunnies, and nearly as buried with questions.   
  
Who was Sohma Momiji? Why were he and my father so close, and what had my mother done? What was the Jyunishi? What was this curse they were speaking of? What did Momiji want to know me for?  
  
Most of all, what should I do?  
  
END PART FOUR  
  
  
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Author's Notes:  
  
The Taidaima/Okaeri is there because I feel it just doesn't translate well... "I'm home" and "Welcome back" would be close approximations.  
  
Thanks to the usual suspects: Bejiin for the Japanese confirmation, Lyra for her help, and Xannee for saying YOU NEED HELP ON THE BETA OF THIS FIC!   
  
I didn't wants to go shonen ai with this, but I knew all along what Haru's motivations were. It's five years later, and the one thing about Furuba is that none of the characters are static. As for Momiji? Well, that's up for debate if he'll return Haru's feelings. Haru's unlucky in love, after all! As for nonstatic, that's why Momiji is so depressive here... but next chapter, we should see the usagi we all know...  
  
Momo's house is built on a Western Design... I needed it so it would have the floor slates. ^_~ 


	5. Enigma

Aishuu Offers:  
Secrets of the Sohma   
Mbsilvana@yahoo.com  
Disclaimers: Fruits Baskets is most assuredly not mine. It belongs to Takaya Natsuki.  
Dedication: For Merrow, for her patience, wisdom, listening to me when I go off on a Furuba rant, and being one of the finest role models out there.  
  
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Part Five: Enigma   
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School that Monday was not where I wanted to be. My mind was not on my lessons, and when Hisae and Nakuru tried to pry the details out of me, my answers were reluctant. I didn't admit to any of the conversation I had overheard.   
  
"It was - difficult," I said. "The family is very diverse, and the personalities overwhelming," was what I would tell them.   
  
I had spent some time Sunday on the Internet, researching Jyunishi and all the various phonetic spellings of the word I could think of, but it had only brought me frustration. All I could find was the story of the Buddha and the other information on the Zodiac, and obviously that wasn't right.   
  
I was never more relieved than when the bell rang that day, signaling the end of classes. I wasn't on duty for the class, and neither were Hisae or Nakuru, so we headed for the front gates. I wanted to go straight home, but on Mondays, we were in the habit of going to the nearby crepe vendor and watching the boys' soccer team at the nearby high school. Hisae had a crush on one of them, and I had to admit there were a few who were pretty cute.   
  
As we approached the gate, though, we heard a whispering which was starting to become all too familiar to me.   
  
"Who is he?" a voice was saying.   
  
"I don't know, but he's gorgeous!"   
  
A feeling formed in the pit of my stomach. I tried to ignore the girls who were flocking forward, watching with a peculiar sense of deja vu. It was like the field day, when they had swarmed to Yuki and the others.   
  
"That hair! I adore blondes!" another was saying.   
  
I knew who it was then, and I sighed in resignation. I wasn't sure if I was ready for this confrontation. "Come on, you two. I'll introduce you," I said to my friends, hastening my footsteps. I hadn't expected Momiji to appear so soon, and I was a bit afraid. I hadn't had a chance to let my thoughts settle.   
  
"Introduce us? Is it another of your cousins?" Hisae asked eagerly, trotting along beside me. Nakuru followed quietly, but I knew she was just as anxious to see which relative I was going to produce this time.   
  
"Most likely, if it's who I think it is..." I said.   
  
We turned around the corner of the building. Momiji was perched on the low wall that ran around the school, ignoring the looks he was receiving. He was dressed in black slacks and an amber dress shirt that fastened with ebony buttons. He had the top two buttons left undone, and was casually gazing around, looking for the entire world as though he belonged there. I really liked the black beret he wore on his head - not many guys could pull the effect off, but Momiji managed it with dashing elegance. Still, what surprised me was the easy way he was chatting with the girls who approached him.   
  
Momiji was gesturing to make some point when his eyes settled on me, and he stopped abruptly. With an apologetic shake of his head to his current company, he hopped off the wall with abundant energy before making his way over to me. My friends watched as he smiled at us, full of mischief and good humor. This was the Momiji I had seen hints of last night, one unburdened by the secrets that seemed to define the Sohma family. If he was cursed, he seemed blithely unconcerned as he leaned over and kissed my cheek warmly. "Hi, Momo-chan!" he said happily. His familiarity was startling, but Momiji seemed to break social rules without a care.   
  
I blushed brilliantly, feeling the eyes of half the girls in school. A good many of the boys whom I knew liked me were also watching with hopelessness, knowing they couldn't compete with Momiji's exceptional beauty. "Hi, Momiji-kun," I said. "What are you doing here?"   
  
He seemed to bounce on the balls of his feet, and I could tell it was hard for him to stay put. "I wanted to go out today, and everyone else was busy," he said. "I was hoping you'd come with me, even if it is a bit of short notice." He looked a bit wistful.   
  
My friends come to flank me, and I could almost feel the heat of their stares as they gawked at him. I knew I was supposed to make introductions, but that would make things more awkward when I tried to ditch them so I could spend time with Momiji, because I fully intended on taking him up on his invitation. I wanted to know him, and resolve those mysteries that he seemed to be the center of.   
  
He noticed my hesitation, and smiled a bit in an attempt to put me at ease. His eyes darted over to them, and with a graceful movement that was amazing and made us catch our breath, he swept his hat off his head and swung into a bow, an European bow that we had never seen anyone perform in real life. "Hello, I'm Sohma Momiji!" he said cheerfully. "Momo-chan is my relative," he added. "And who are you two lovely ladies?" There was a flirtatiousness to him, but it was innocent and not at all smarmy. He was a good nine years older than we were, but I could see that he was playing. From the delighted looks on Nakuru and Hisae's faces, I knew that they knew it as well, but it was still wonderful to have someone as handsome as Momiji to flirt with.   
  
"I'm Tsukasa Hisae," Hisae said, bowing. Momiji held out his hand, again using those foreign gestures, and I wondered if I had been right, to think him gaijin. Hisae took it awkwardly, unable to get a good grip to shake, but he turned her clumsiness into grace, raising it to his lips to brush a light kiss across her knuckles.   
  
"You're going to be a beautiful lady not too long in the future!" He let it go gently, and Hisae blushed brilliantly, and I knew that it would be weeks before she recovered from this crush. Nakuru's eyes widened as he turned to her. He was perceptive again, instinctively knowing that she was the shyer of the two. "And you are?"   
  
"Hanazawa Nakuru," she said, her voice barely above a whisper. She held out a trembling hand, but from the light in her face I could tell she was anticipating Momiji's courtly gesture. He didn't disappoint, bowing over her hand before depositing a kiss upon her hand as well.   
  
"You certainly are lovely company for Momo-chan to keep!" he said. He looked over at me as he stepped away from a furiously flushing Nakuru, who was now the envy of every girl at school. "Do you have plans, Momo-chan?" he pressed.   
  
"Well..." I said, glancing at my friends, hoping they would understand my wanting to be alone with Momiji. They nodded, but Momiji caught the exchange.   
  
"Oh? Were you going to go do something together?" he asked. We looked guilty, I am quite sure, because he laughed brightly, and it was like the sun peek through the clouds.   
  
"Nakuru-chan, Hisae-chan, how about I take you out for some ice cream with Momo-chan and myself? To make up for destroying your plans?" he asked.   
  
My friends were quickly beside him, though I wished they had been polite enough to refuse. "Really, Sohma-san?" Hisae, always the bolder of the two asked.   
  
"Really! How often does a man get to escort three princesses around?" He replaced his hat on his fair head and winked at us playfully. "Though I would prefer it if you'd call me Momiji- there're (plural!) so many Sohmas around that it gets confusing if you call me Sohma-san... I always wonder which one of us is being addressed."   
  
We laughed at his easy charm and he gestured at us to follow him. Neither of my friends seemed particularly concerned about following a strange man, and I clung to my schoolbag, watching him as we left the schoolyard. I felt the envious eyes of all the other girls on us, and knew another round of questions and begging for pictures would be coming my way tomorrow.   
  
"Momiji-kun?" I said. "Where is everyone today?"   
  
"Had had classes, Yuki was working on his Masters' thesis, and Tohru went to Ayame's shop for a wedding gown fitting since Yuki wasn't present to get in the way."  
  
"Get in the way?" I asked.   
  
"Um, Yuki and Ayame don't get along real well," Momiji said with a bit of embarrassment. "I'm sure you've noticed."   
  
"It was pretty obvious," I agreed. I remembered Yuki delivering a kick to his older brother's chin and tried not to laugh. It had been an amazing sight.   
  
My friends just looked confused as Momiji continued. "Hari - um, that's Hatori - is busy working, and so is Kyou, and Shigure is currently being threatened by his editor. And those are the people I hang out with most."   
  
"Those are all relatives of yours..." Nakuru said.   
  
"Yup! All Sohmas..." Momiji confirmed.   
  
"Is there any reason that you hang out with your family so much? I mean, you're so handsome and nice, surely you have many friends outside of your clan..." she said, then blushed and looked away.   
  
I could have kissed her. In her innocence, she had asked the thing I could not. Maybe bringing Nakuru and Hisae along had been a good idea, after all.  
  
Momiji seemed to lose a bit of his good cheer. "The inner Sohma clan ties its members to each other tightly. We often intermarry. It's not anything that must be, it's simply something that is, because it's easier for us."   
  
"Why?" Hisae asked.   
  
Momiji seemed to dim even more. "It's because we're Sohma." He became a bit distant, and I knew that those secrets weighed heavily on him.   
  
"Momo-chan, look! There's the parlor!" he said with delight. I glanced at my friends, clearly recognizing that he was changing the topic. We shrugged, following him in. He smiled at the waitress and waltzed over to one of the best corner booths, at his ease here. The menus were quickly procured and we sat, studying them. "Order what you want," he told us. "Money isn't an object," he said, when he saw Hisae mentally start tallying the price of the more expensive confection. "And don't worry about gaining weight, either. You're all too beautiful to be concerned."   
  
We all laughed. "How closely are you two related?" Hisae asked. "You look enough alike to be siblings."   
  
I blinked at her in surprise. "I hadn't noticed that... everyone says I look like my Mama..."   
  
Momiji was quiet for a moment before answering. "It's not surprising we look alike. My mama was German, too."   
  
The waitress came then to take our orders, and it wasn't until later that I realized that he hadn't answered the question. We spent two hours in the parlor, stuffing ourselves with the richest desserts imaginable. Momiji playfully swiped bites of each of ours, offering his in return, but I noticed that he seemed nervous and jumpy whenever the door opened. Still, he was talkative and easy to talk to, and within minutes we all felt like we had known him for years. He had that about him, a way of making you feel like you were the most important person in the world to him. He would bounce from subject to subject, and we would breathlessly follow after him, but it was okay. We just wanted to bask in his presence.   
  
Soon, though, we had to leave to go home. He bid Hisae and Nakuru farewell before turning to me. "It's time to..."   
  
"Can you walk me home? We haven't spent any time together, just us," I said. I pouted prettily, the way I did when I wanted my father to do something for me. Momiji was no more immune to it than Papa. "I guess," he agreed reluctantly.   
  
I took his hand, unwilling to let him go. Something was nagging at me. I couldn't quite fit it together, but I knew I was on the verge of a major revelation. Something... something he had said.  
  
"Momiji, why don't you like my Mama?" I asked after a moment.   
  
He looked over at me out of the corner of his eye, but continued to walk briskly. "Momo-chan, I don't know your Mama," he said softly. "Why would I dislike her?"   
  
I wondered about that. "But you're very close to my Papa," I said.   
  
"I was, once," he said. "We've grown apart."   
  
"What happened?" I asked. I knew I was being rude, but I didn't care. I wanted answers, and all roads were leading straight to him.  
  
His grip on my hand tightened minutely, then relaxed before it became painful. "There're things in life we can't control. There're feelings we don't understand, and sometimes we're placed in positions where we're forced to choose between the person we love most and the person we're supposed to protect. And sometimes we're asked to make a choice when really there is no choice at all, and the result hurts us deeply." Momiji tilted his head back to bask his face in the late afternoon sunlight. "All we can do is hold onto the faith that things will work out... That's what happened, Momo-chan."   
  
The vagueness of his answer drove me nuts. I wanted blunt honesty, but Momiji was a Sohma, as people were telling me I was not. The Sohmas apparently wouldn't know what the word "direct" meant if it bit them.  
  
"Momiji-kun, what does it mean to be a Sohma? A real Sohma?"   
  
He stopped. "You don't want to know. You really don't."   
  
His hand grew painfully tight around mine but I stared him down, refusing to drop the subject. "Yes, I do. Everyone keeps going on about a "real" and "true" Sohma, and I need to know what that is! I'm obviously not!"   
  
"For which you are blessed," he whispered. "A real Sohma knows what pain and suffering is, Momo-chan, on a level that most humans can't begin to comprehend."   
  
The sky around us seemed to darken and a sense of foreboding gripped me at his words. His skin felt clammy to the touch, and I rubbed it gently, trying to restore warmth. "Why do you smile, then?"   
  
"I smile because if I don't, I'd never stop crying," he replied, before flashing the smile that stole my heart again. It was a smile full of shattered innocence, with a belief that somewhere, someone else was having a better life. It dawned on me that I was one for whom he hoped would have that fate. Despite my selfish questions, Momiji wanted me to have the life he apparently could not.  
  
I wanted to cry for him, shed the tears he refused to. I knew he wasn't joking when he said that he knew pain. "I'm sorry... I'm hurting you..." I said, turning my face aside as I was unable to meet his amber eyes, feeling the tears build up in my eyes. He was being so kind, and I was being cruel in return, asking nosy and hurtful questions.   
  
We turned down the side street, and he paused again. "Momo-chan... you should never cry for me. Please, don't cry. I couldn't bear it..." His voice trembled and I stared at him. His face was profoundly wounded, and I wanted to embrace him. I made a move to, but he stepped aside deftly. "Don't," he said. "A true Sohma never is to be embraced. It's part of our sorrow..."   
  
I accepted it, although I didn't understand. I wished I didn't feel so helpless. "Momiji-kun? Is there anything I can do? You seem so sad..."   
  
His pale hands cradled my cheeks as he had done earlier, the night before when he had told me to be happy and warned me not to seek out the family secrets. "Just be happy, Momo-chan. When someone's happy, their happiness shines like a candle for the rest of the world to share." His amber eyes pleaded with me as he reiterated his message, and I stared at him, trying not to fall under the magic spell all my male relatives seemed able to cast as easily as they breathed. Their beauty, their sorrow... I wanted to embrace him and promise him the world, but he had already denied me that.  
  
I opened my mouth to say something, anything, but the sound of approaching footsteps caught us off guard. Momiji's hand fell away, and we turned in unison to see my mother. I braced myself, waiting for her to start yelling at him, or me, or most likely the both of us. Seeing your thirteen-year-old daughter having her face touched so gently by a man you hardly knew, even if he was a relative, would certainly bring up protective instincts in a parent.  
  
She stopped, startled, as she took in the scene before her. "Hello, Momiji-san," she said after a moment. Mama looked at us, but didn't say anything more.  
  
Momiji's hands fell away from me, and I felt strangely bereft of his warmth. "Hello, Sohma-san," he replied, and he gave her a beatific smile, one which didn't hold any of the undercurrents which I found so fascinating about him. It seemed as though all his sorrows had been forced aside so he could show my mother an innocent face. "How are you today?"   
  
"I'm well. How are your studies going?"   
  
"Quite well. I'll be entering a masters program next fall," he said easily, shifting his hands behind his back. He tilted his head a bit, the faint smile still playing across his lips. He looked more like one of my classmates than a man nearly a decade my senior.  
  
"That's quite good. I didn't know you knew Momo-chan," she said. Was this it? I wondered. Was she about to accuse Momiji of something now?  
  
"Yuki asked me to keep an eye out for her," he said easily, and I knew that this was only half the truth. I remembered him forcing Papa into letting him see me. I stared at Mama, wondering what she would do. If Momiji had been the child the family hated her over, then she wouldn't want him anywhere near me.  
  
I almost gasped in shock when I got a good look at Mama's face. There was something wrong with her - a curiously blankness to her expression, as though her eyes weren't really seeing Momiji. They seemed to be looking at a place right over his shoulder, and I wondered if there was something wrong with her. "Mama?" I said. Seeing her eyes like that scared me.  
  
"Oh, yes, Momo-chan. Come, let's go inside. I need to get dinner going. Sohma-san, it was nice to see you again." She vaguely nodded her head to him, and turned to the door.  
  
"You too," he said politely. "Momo-chan, I'll be seeing you," he promised, squeezing my hand and dropping it before vanishing down the street.   
  
"Mama? Are you okay?"   
  
She blinked at me, and she seemed to come back to reality. "Oh, yes. Momo-chan, what are you doing out here? It's cold - you shouldn't stand around."   
  
"Mama, we were just talking to Momiji-kun," I said. I wondered if she was losing it.   
  
"Momiji-kun? Who? Oh, yes. Yes, Momiji-kun. Let's go inside," she said, gesturing.   
  
I looked at her in confusion before stomping inside. It took me moments to race up to my room. Things were taking on a frightening picture. Mama had forgotten seeing Momiji moments after he left, and while he had been there, she had acted so strangely.   
  
I shut the door behind me, heading over to my bed so I could lie down to think. Staring at the ceiling, I toyed with the cotton of my quilt, picking at it with my fingers. It gave me something to do while I tried to think things through. I knew I had all the pieces before me. I could feel it. Now I just had to fit them together.  
  
It had started for me on the field day, when someone -probably Momiji- had sent my cousins to me. My history teacher, though, told me to look for root causes, the source of the problem, and as I considered it, I knew that Sohma Momiji was the key. Haru had acted to bring me into the family on his account, because he was in love with him. Yuki and the others had gone along with him, probably deciding it wasn't worth annoying Black Haru. So... I was important to Momiji, but why?  
  
Momiji was playful at heart. I had seen him whenever the family gathered, bouncing between cousins without fear of rejection. Wherever he went, laughter followed, and everyone in the family loved him... except for Mama. Mama seemed to have a pleasant, distant attitude towards him, but seeing how she'd forgotten about speaking to him moments after he had left had chilled me to the bone. It wasn't natural - it was like she wanted to forget him, for some reason.  
  
But why would anyone want to forget him?   
  
I'd noticed how he kept away from us, those New Years Eves, when the entire Sohma clan gathered. I had assumed that Momiji kept away because he, along with the rest of the family, shunned Mama and me. But clearly I had been wrong. Momiji wanted to know me.  
  
Why? What was his relationship to Papa?  
  
Something Hisae had asked came back to me then. 'How closely are you two related? You look enough alike to be siblings.'  
  
And Momiji had never answered, deftly avoiding the question.  
  
It clicked... Papa... had had an affair. Men tended to like women of the same type, so he had fallen for another gaijin woman. Mama had found out, and hadn't been able to cope, and had taken it out on the child. Finally some kind of traumatic amnesia had set in. It would be good reason for the clan to hate her.   
  
No matter how I looked at it, all added up. Momiji was Papa's illegitimate son.   
  
Momiji was my brother.   
  
END PART FIVE  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
Author's Notes:  
  
Okay, so she's starting to get the hint. She's not QUITE there yet, but...  
  
The reason for Momiji's mother's reaction on meeting him again is because we've never quite learned how thorough the memory repression is... but it's all about wanting to forget. It's hypnotism, and I think his mother would keep linking new memories of Momiji to Hatori's hypnotic suggestion and bury it. When we saw her in Momiji's past episode, she looked very vacant as she left.  
  
Credits to Xandra as beta (yes, I'll be a colloquial American) Lyra for her efforts on my behalf, and Pero for answering my Jade Emperor question. 


	6. Twilight

Aishuu Offers:  
Secrets of the Sohma   
Mbsilvana@yahoo.com  
Disclaimers: Fruits Baskets is most assuredly not mine. It belongs to Takaya Natsuki.  
Dedication: For Raye, because she's the one who can complete my sentence before I can think of it. And because she knows me better than I know myself, sometimes.  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
Part Six: Twilight  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
The next day, my classes were buzzing over Momiji. The girls all wanted to know more about him, but I maintained a stony silence. My mind was still too filled with my new realization to want to talk about him, but Hisae and Nakuru happily filled in for me, dreamily telling all who would listen about him. He had been so charming to them that they had crushes, just as I had anticipated before I had figured out that Momiji was my brother.  
  
I was still too shocked to do anything except think on the fact that no one had told me that I had an older brother. It was so obvious. We looked so much alike, and Papa obviously loved him very much. No one ever spoke of his parents and the way he had wanted to know me... and the bit about his reacting in pain to being a "niisan." So many little clues, all adding up to one big picture that meant pain for the most golden of the inner Sohmas...  
  
When class let out, I abandoned my friends to race to the front gate, hoping that he would be there. Perhaps now that I had figured the truth out, Momiji would tell me the truth, if I asked him directly. Momiji seemed to be a master of the half-truths that were a staple of my life, but he hadn't outright lied to me yet.  
  
"It's Sohma-sama!" I heard as I made my way towards the gate, and I grinned to myself. He had come, I thought as the girls chatter drifted on the wind toward me.  
  
I rounded the corner of the school, preparing to drag him off somewhere private before a friend could get herself invited along, but to my shock, it was not Momiji's golden figure that met my eyes.   
  
Sohma Hatsuharu leaned against the wall, casually toying with a pair of Raybans. He was wearing black clothes and tight faux leather pants together with a muscle shirt that clung to him, displaying a toned body. Together with the silver jewelry he always wore in abundance and the black combat boots, he looked like he had just come from a live house.  
  
I skidded to a stop, wondering what to do. Haru had been the one to start me on my quest for the truth, but something about the way he was standing, a subtle tension in his bearing, made me wonder if I was going to like what he had on his mind.   
  
"Hello," he said, bowing politely. His manners were at direct odds with his appearance, but I remembered that night when he fought with Kyou, and knew enough to be cautious. Haru was a study in contradictions.  
  
"Hello, Haru-niisan. Are you looking for me?" I asked, though it was obvious he had to be.   
  
He smiled, but there was a serious quality to it that made my heart freeze. "Yes, Momo-chan. I need to speak with you. Can you spare a few hours?"   
  
"Hours?" I echoed. "I...." The feeling of foreboding grew.  
  
"I'll explain to your father later," he said, and from his tone I knew what he needed to say was important.   
  
An idea came to me, and I met his gray eyes. "It sounds like a good idea. I have some questions I need answered about something, Haru-niisan," I said, stressing the honorific.   
  
He understood what I was hinting at, nodding slightly with satisfaction. "Let's go." He jerked his head, but made no move to touch me. "There's a bridge about half a mile away," he suggested as we started off. "Under it, we can have some privacy."   
  
"Under a bridge?" I echoed.   
  
"It's a quiet place that no one will bother us. I think you may have some of the truth, but the truth isn't always what you think it is. Have you ever looked in the water and seen your reflection?"   
  
"Of course," I replied, confused.   
  
"Imagine that I'm throwing stones in, shattering the image you see, but asking you to describe your reflection anyway. That's the truth you're seeing, Momo-chan. It may resemble what is real, but it's not the reality." We were rapidly approaching a bridge that I crossed over daily and had never given a second thought to, but Haru veered off the road, and made his way easily down the hill, leaving me to stare behind him. He had been serious about the under the bridge thing, I recognized with a bit of nervousness.   
  
"Um..." The incline was steep, and I wasn't that athletic. I was seriously worried about taking a header and scrambling my brains.  
  
"Are you coming?" he asked.   
  
Decision time. Would I take the bull by the horns, and make the choice to take my fate in my own hands? I nodded, and stumbled slightly as I went down the grassy hill, the slope challenging my footing.   
  
Haru arrived at the bottom long before I did, and watched me descend. I wondered if he would catch me, should I fall, or watch me roll unhindered. It was an uncharitable thought, but I was under the impression that Haru believed that people needed to grow on their own. He would protect them, love them, but he always did what he believed was best for them, even if they disagreed. He looked around the place, a bit bemused. "I met Tohru here," he said. "I'm amazed I found it again."   
  
"Oh?" I asked.   
  
"I have problems locating things sometimes," he said, looking over at the shaded area beneath the bridge, where the grass grew high.   
  
"You mean you get lost," I said bluntly. "I heard about that."   
  
"Did you?" he said idly. "It's not one of the bigger secrets. I tend to start off for somewhere and end up taking a few extra days to get there... it's not a big deal. I always get to where I'm going. Shigure says that I just take a scenic route." He seemed amused, and took me by the elbow and led me to the place he had been examining. "Luckily I've been getting better about it, though I think I'll always need to keep my cell phone bill up to date and battery charged."   
  
"But there are bigger secrets," I said, pouncing on his words. "How is it that no one ever told me that Momiji was my brother?" I demanded. "An affair isn't that shameful a thing and even though Mama may not like it, Momiji exists!"   
  
Haru had been expecting my question, obviously. He leaned against the gray stones of the bridge, watching my face. "You're a smart child, but it's not as simple as you think." He shut his eyes, and I could see that he was trying to think of where to start. "Your Papa never had an affair, Momo-chan. Momiji isn't your half brother."   
  
"But-" I began. The pieces I had fit together so perfectly came apart, and I looked at him in confusion. He... if Momiji wasn't my brother... what the hell was going on?  
  
I felt like crying with frustration.  
  
Haru ran a hand through his white hair. "Hatori isn't just a doctor. He has a special gift. He has the ability to make people forget."   
  
The look in Mama's eyes...   
  
The blankness...  
  
Papa's fear that he would see the same look in my eyes....   
  
The pieces rearranged, and Haru's words about examining a scattered reflection help me fit them together. "He's mama's son, too... that's Momiji's secret..." I said. "He looks so much like me, and I was right about how I look like Mama... he looks like her, too." I knew I was rambling, but I figured that under the circumstances, it was excusable.  
  
Haru placed a reassuring hand on my shoulder. "When he was four, Hatori took your Mama's memory of Momiji away because she couldn't stand the sight of him. He was raised by different members of the family."   
  
"Why?" I demanded. "Why did Hatori do such a thing?" The idea of it was monstrous. Mama loved children! I would have loved having Momiji as my older brother, and Papa obviously cared for him greatly... so why had Momiji been wiped from her mind?  
  
"Because she couldn't accept what Momiji is. She couldn't accept his true nature," Haru stated grimly. There was anger in his gray eyes, his irises darkening until they verged on black.  
  
"What-" I started, but a voice interrupted.   
  
"Haru!"   
  
We spun around, and Momiji stood under the bridge, with Kyou beside him. Kyou was out of breath, and Momiji's eyes seemed to be shattered. He took a look at me, and summed up the situation all at once. "Haru, step away from her." Momiji commanded in a soft, sorrowful voice.   
  
"Momiji. You can't run anymore. Momo-chan is stronger than your mother. She's strong enough to know the truth, and to love you. She can accept it," Haru replied softly. He stayed beside me, and the tension level rose.  
  
I stared at my older brother, wondering what could be so horrible about him that Mama would reject him. A secret that others in the family would share, a secret that would differentiate between real Sohmas and ordinary people. "Momiji, what does it mean to be a real Sohma?" I demanded.   
  
Momiji glanced away from me, unable to meet my eyes. "It means a curse."   
  
The name clicked-- it was what I had heard him speak before, that night with papa. "Jyunishi..." I whispered. "What does it mean, to be Jyunishi?"   
  
All three of my relatives stiffened before Haru laughed. "She's smart, Momiji. You might as well show her."   
  
"NO!" Momiji exclaimed. "Please, no!" There was a desperate appeal in his voice.   
  
Kyou stared at all of us, but remained quiet, apparently deciding this wasn't his fight.   
  
Haru seemed to waver, but looked at Momiji instead of me. "I hugged a girl once, under this bridge, to prove how much I loved Yuki. Can I do any less for you?" Haru asked.   
  
Kyou shut his eyes and turned away as I stared in confusion at Haru.   
  
"NO!" Momiji yelled again, but it was too late.   
  
Haru wrapped his arms around me, pulling me tightly against his warm body. He smelled like the outdoors and cinnamon, and some unique fragrance that I couldn't identify. Before I could figure it out, his embrace was complete, and then I knew. I knew what it meant to be Jyunishi, for there was the sound of a slight "poof" and smoke, and suddenly a ox was standing beside me where Haru had been the moment before.   
  
*  
  
Kyou was the one who remained calm.   
  
I went into shock, just standing there. Momiji started to laugh, and his laughter quickly became hysterical. "Haru, you idiot!" he yelled, before spinning around on his ankle and disappearing up the hill. The ox who had taken Haru's place remained motionless next to me. It was Kyou who reacted.   
  
He strode over to me, spinning me around and looking me in the eye. "Don't look at Haru," he ordered, not unkindly. "When he reverts, he won't be wearing anything."   
  
I didn't say anything, but simply stared into Kyou's cinnamon-colored eyes. "Chibi, you know now. If you want, I can have Hatori help you..." he offered. Kyou's voice was gruff with reluctance from making that offer.   
  
That shook me out of my shock. "Help?" I echoed. "You mean... erase my memory?"   
  
"You're a Sohma, and Yuki won't order it done if you want to remember, but if you decide it's too much for you to handle, that you'll be miserable knowing the truth, then Hatori will do it." He glanced over my shoulder at Haru. "I hope you're happy with yourself, Haru!" he said. His face was rigid with suppressed anger, and I could tell he was on the verge of making himself a steak dinner.  
  
"It needed to be done," was Haru's placid reply. Even though his words were calm, I knew he had just sacrificed something amazing for me, something I didn't understand. My mind focused on that, using that to remind myself that Haru was human; not an ox. Haru was cursed; so was my brother... and probably some of the other Sohmas.  
  
"You're an idiot," Kyou snapped back.  
  
"Are you... a Jyunishi as well?" I asked, my mind beginning to focus on others.   
  
Kyou looked uncomfortable. "Kind of...."   
  
"What... do you mean?"   
  
"He means he's outside of the Jyunishi, though he has a curse like the rest of us," came another voice. Sohma Yuki had arrived, and I stared at him as he glared at Haru. "I see I'm too late. Is Momiji already gone?" His soft voice was full of concern, but the dignified way he carried himself helped me calm down even more than Kyou's hurried offer. Yuki was clan head; he would be able to sort this all out.  
  
"Yes," Haru sighed. I could hear his voice, and it was only Kyou's warning that kept me from turning around to look at him as he spoke, a natural instinct. "I think he's rather upset," Haru continued.   
  
"I wonder why," Kyou said sarcastically.   
  
"No fighting," Yuki said. "I'll play with you later, Kyou, but right now, Momiji and Momo are our concerns," he said. He looked at me, and his violet eyes were gentle. "Are you okay?"   
  
"I'm so confused..." I murmured. There was a poof sound behind me, the same sound that I had heard when Haru had hugged me.   
  
"Get dressed," Yuki ordered, and I assumed Haru had changed back. "I'll deal with you later."   
  
"I think Momiji will deal with him quite well enough," Kyou inserted. He and Yuki locked glances, and some kind of silent communication passed between them that I didn't understand.  
  
Yuki considered that. "Agreed," he said, before turning to me. "Momo-chan, the Jyunishi is the family secret, obviously. At any time, twelve members of the family are cursed to turn into the spirits from the Zodiac, and there are also two others who share in the curse - the cat and the god. It's complex, and I don't have the time to explain it now. You need to make a decision, a large one. Can you deal with it?"   
  
"Momiji- what's his curse?" I asked. I tried to imagine which creature my brother turned into, which one had so repulsed my mother that she had denied his existence.  
  
"What do you think?" Yuki asked. I shut my eyes, trying to run through what I knew of the Jyunishi.   
  
"I... I don't know."  
  
"You'll have to ask him. It's not our secret to tell," Yuki said.   
  
"What's yours?" I asked Yuki. He was obviously one of the Jyunishi, but which? Haru was the ox, and Kyou was probably the cat, since they mentioned he was outside the Jyunishi and I couldn't see him being the god. It was easier to focus on the curses then what I was going to do about Momiji.  
  
Haru leaned over and playfully brushed a hand against Yuki's cheek. "Momo-chan, you'll learn it's rude to ask a Jyunishi what their curse is. They have to show you, as a sign of trust."  
  
I felt myself blush again. "I- I... didn't mean to offend."   
  
Yuki's smile was amused as he looked at me, but then his eyes grew cold as he pushed Haru's hand back. "I don't know what has gotten into you, but this goes far beyond the usual antics of the Black. You've been manipulating Momo-chan since you met her, and it's going to stop."  
  
"It has," Haru whispered. "I've done what I needed to do. She's where she needs to be. I couldn't tell her the truth, but she needed to know. There are too many secrets in the Sohma family, and if we're ever to break the curse we impose on ourselves, we have to break the silence."  
  
Kyou growled. "I don't like where you're going. You've hurt Momiji."   
  
"Sometimes a wound has to be cauterized before it can heal." Haru came to stand by me. His eyes held incredible sadness as I looked at him.   
  
"But did the fire burn you as well?" I asked.   
  
All three of my cousins winced. "She's too smart," Kyou said. "You need to make things clear, Yuki."   
  
The interim clan head nodded. "Momo, what I was trying to say is that you have a choice. You can choose to remember, or you can choose to forget." He looked at me intently.   
  
"You mean have Hatori erase my memory?"  
  
My question appeared to discomfit him, for Yuki turned away. "If you want. Or you can keep the memory, but walk away. We may be related by blood, but that doesn't make us a family."  
  
"I-"   
  
"I'll give you three days before you make the decision," Yuki said. "But this kind of decision is one that if you wait on, you'll hurt those who are waiting for you. So..." He seemed old then, and I knew he regretted ever assuming Akito's duties.  
  
Kyou, despite his obvious antipathy towards Yuki at times, rescued him. "Yuki, let's find Momiji. He's going to need us."  
  
I turned to Haru. "Will you stay? I need some more answers."   
  
Haru glanced at Yuki for permission. Yuki nodded slowly. "You've made your bed, Haru. Now you have to lie on it. Momo-chan, no matter what, none of this was meant to hurt you. I hope you know that."   
  
He turned and disappeared into the late afternoon, Kyou following on his heels. I could hear him raise his voice to Kyou, and they fell to bickering.   
  
That left Haru and me alone. Haru seemed somehow more distant, without any of the cousins around him. "Let's go up top," he suggested. "I don't want to lurk in the shadows any longer."   
  
I mutely started to follow him, but the hill was just as steep and I soon found myself falling behind. It took me twice as long to climb the hill, and by the time I made it to the top, he was already on the bridge, standing in the center, gazing out at the coming night.   
  
It was a pretty bridge, used for foot traffic. Haru was oddly out of place as he was in most places where I saw him. No one expected a punk to be where Haru usually showed up, and the serenity he projected, even stranger. He had a calm aura that made one want to ask him about the secrets of the world. I just wanted the rest of the truth.   
  
"Haru, why did you do all of this?" I demanded. "You've obviously upset Momiji and Yuki's not very happy with you."   
  
He was still for a moment, lost in his reflections before he began to speak. "The Momiji you've gotten to know isn't the Momiji I grew up with," Haru said. He stared out over the bridge, and the wind caressed his hair. "He was joyful, seemingly untouched by the sorrow of our curse. I knew he wanted to be acknowledged by your mother desperately, and he wanted to know you as a brother, but your father kept him away, because your mother was... broken. After giving birth to a cursed child, some women break. Your mother was one of them.   
  
"But he retained hope. He was the one who always smiled, who always laughed. And we all loved him for it." Haru's fist clenched on the railing as he leaned over it. My breath caught. I wondered how close to falling he was. "He retained his belief that everything would work out."   
  
"What happened?" I asked. I remembered overhearing Momiji's conversation with my father, and knew something earth-shattering had happened to him. While there were still glimmers of light in my brother, shadows lurked in his eyes, and his faith in the essential goodness of humanity was missing.   
  
Haru spoke only one word, but the monotone voice he used, conveyed volumes. "Akito."   
  
I shivered. Darkness seemed to be the legacy of the former clan head, and I hated to admit it, but a small part of me was glad he was dead. I had never met him, but the other Sohma members I was coming to know seemed terrified of him. "What... what did Akito do?"   
  
"Akito seemed to delight in tormenting the Jyunishi. Yuki was his particular toy, but he played with all of us, knew our fears and worked us over. We couldn't stand up to him; he was the god. That's the reason he was clan head. He was born to represent the Jade Emperor." I remembered the tales of the Jyunishi party, and wondered about it.   
  
Haru was lost in his reflections, and his voice fell to almost a whisper. "The day before he died, he called Momiji in to see him."   
  
My eyes widened. "That would have been three years ago?"   
  
Haru nodded to confirm my memory. "Momiji was eighteen and had just graduated high school. He had such plans, and he laughed off our concern; most of the Jyunishi members were waiting outside for him to come back. Akito was known to be abusive, and he knew how to take people apart. But Momiji said that there was nothing Akito could do; he would heal if Akito hit him. He went in to see Akito, and when he came out... he wasn't the same. Something had taken some of the joy out of him. It was Akito's last act. He took away the most joyous of us."   
  
"What did Akito do?" I wondered. I felt a surge of hate for anyone who could hurt Momiji; how could anyone want to steal his laughter?  
  
"No one knows. We know Akito knew the day he was going to die; that was part of his curse. He never told us it would be that particular day, but he knew. He was born knowing. But to destroy Momiji as his last action was nothing we would have foreseen. Yuki was his favorite, or Kyou or even Hatori. But Momiji? None of us saw it coming."   
  
"And that's why he did it," I said. "Because no one saw it coming, and because Momiji gave you all so much happiness. By taking away your source of laughter, he hurt all of you. The others were prepared to be hurt by Akito; I bet Momiji wasn't."   
  
Haru turned to me, stepping away from the railing. The twilight bathed his face in the strange shades only seen for those brief minutes when it was neither day or night. I thought the time suited Haru perfectly, because he was neither black nor white at the moment, but a shade of gray as he stared at me intently. "You're wise for one so young. I wonder why we didn't see it."   
  
"Because you're too close." I felt the cool air tug at me and shivered. It was getting colder out, and I wished I had brought a jacket. "Why do you love him?" I was curious to know.   
  
He looked startled. "How..."   
  
I blushed, and decided it was time to confess. "I overheard Papa and Momiji. Papa said that you were doing everything because you loved Momiji. And it wasn't a platonic love from the way he spoke."   
  
"No. It's not." Haru replied reflectively. "There's more than one way to love someone, and you can love more than one person at a time. I will always cherish Yuki for being my first love, for being the one to show me that I wasn't bound by the legends surrounding the Jyunishi. But that's a child's love, pure. I don't long to pursue anything more than see him happy - knowing he's with Tohru brings me joy.   
  
"Rin was my first adult relationship. We entered as children, seeking to find a place beyond the sorrow of our curses, and because of that, we were doomed to failure. We clung to each other because there was no one else." Haru smiled faintly as he lost himself in his memories. "But what I learned from her was that there is someone else who can care for me. That Yuki wasn't the entire world."   
  
"How... how did Momiji fit into this?" I wondered.   
  
"I always seemed to follow my 'black' side when it came to love. Fall fast, fall hard and passionately. But with Momiji, it was different. We're the same age, and have always been together. I was used to his presence, and I liked it. It wasn't until he was taken away from me that I realized how much I loved him."   
  
"Are you sure it's not just concern?" I had to ask. The knowledge that Momiji was my brother had only been mine for twenty-four hours, but already I was developing protective instincts for him. I wanted him the same way he wanted me. I wanted to be his sister, and from what I knew of siblings, that meant keeping each other safe.   
  
Haru's eyes grew more intense, and I wondered if I was invoking the dreaded Black by challenging him. "I've seen Akito torment others. Kisa, Rin, Kyou, Hatori. Even when it was Yuki, it didn't cut me so deeply. But I knew when I saw Momiji after he left that room that I loved him. I don't know when it happened, but I knew I wanted him like I wanted nothing else. I want to see him smile again, Momo, and for him to smile, he needs you. He needs to hope, and you're his hope."   
  
That shook me to the core. It was a burden, to be someone's hope. "I-"   
  
"You need to get home. It's late and your family will be worried."   
  
That saddened me. Had Papa ever worried where Momiji was? "I do need to go, but when I get there, they'll know where I was..." I said. I knew that my knowledge would be written all over my face, because I was a rotten liar.  
  
Haru smiled a bit, and there was something in it that matched his punkish appearance. "Do what you want with your father, but your mother... as much as I dislike her, talk to your father first. She doesn't remember anything."   
  
I nodded, turning away from him. "What Papa says will help me determine what I do next. I want to promise that I will be able to help Momiji, but -" I stumbled, trying to find the words.   
  
"Don't make promises you can't keep. There's too much hurt as it is." He nodded, waving a hand before going back to stare at the rising moon. The white light drained him of color and reflected oddly. He had dismissed me, but that was okay.   
  
I had learned everything I needed to from Sohma Hatsuharu. The next step on the road I was traveling would be to confront my father, Sohma Mitsuru.   
END PART FIVE  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
Author's Notes:  
  
And she's THERE!   
  
Okay, a livehouse is kind of like a club - really more on the music side, though. You see a bunch of them in animes like Kaikan Phase. And Haru looks like he belongs there.  
  
Akito as Jade Emperor, Rin and Haru's relationship, yada yada... well, it's all my own spin since I'm ignoring the manga as I write this since the Rin/Haru kiss came out JUST as I was finishing the draft of this section. The date I've completed THIS is March 8, 2003.  
  
Credits to Xandra as beta (and I will learn not to say something is "not priority!") Lyra for her efforts on my behalf, and Merrow for sounding boarding the end. 


	7. Blackness

Aishuu Offers:

  


Secrets of the Sohma 

  


Mbsilvana@yahoo.com

  


Disclaimers: Fruits Baskets is most assuredly not mine. It belongs to Takaya Natsuki.

  


Dedication: For members of the Quicksilver ML, since they take the time to let me know. And this was what they wanted, so.... 

  


~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

  


Part Seven: Blackness

  


~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

  


My head was spinning as I walked home. It wasn't surprising, really, when I found out that my family's secret wasn't quite what one would consider normal. I had expected Momiji to be illegitimate or something like that - that I could have handled. But knowing that he and other members were cursed to turn into some kind of animal when hugged and that Mama had been made to forget him through some kind of weird hypnosis...

  


Well, I couldn't be blamed for not guessing the truth, could I? 

  


I felt my slow-boiling temper about to blow. I had just about had it with being lied to, kept in the dark, manipulated, protected and fed shades of truth. I wanted nothing but the unvarnished, whole truth. Papa was about to be the victim of one of my rare explosions. The family may fear Black Haru, but I was about to demonstrate that Black Momo was ten times worse.

  


When you're little, nothing and no one seems stronger than your father. I was now going to confront that, and remake my world. Inside of me, I felt a nervous, sick feeling, wondering if I was doing the right thing. I was about to take the foundation of my world and rip it apart, all because of a brother I really didn't know.

  


Did I really want to do this? I wondered as my house came into sight. The option Kyou had offered, and Yuki had seconded, to allow my memory to be erased, which I had immediately rejected, was becoming tempting. It would be so easy to just forget, and go back to my normal life. To forget about these impossible things, and forget about...

  


Then I thought of my mother's eyes, and Momiji's pain. It was not anything I wanted for myself, imaging what I would look like with that same emptiness. We are the sum of our memories, I thought, and if I let Hatori erase the confusion and pain, I would no longer be Momo. I would be someone else... someone with a terrifying blankness and who the family hated because I wasn't strong enough to deal with the truth.

  


I came to the front door, and bit down on my lip. Haru had faith that I was strong enough; Yuki seemed to trust me. I would do this, I vowed. Within me, there was rage simmering, rage at thirteen years of lies, rage on behalf of a gentle man who had tried to keep people happy at the cost of himself, rage at the world and its unfairness. I was angry, and Papa was the one who would have to deal with it.

  


The night was thick and heavy around me, weighing me down with an almost unbearable pressure as I turned the handle with my shaking hand. It took a second to gain the courage to call out.

  


"Tadaima!"

  


No "Okaeri!" answered me, and the tension in my stomach rose. I knew I had been out late, too late, without letting them know where I was. They were probably ready to ground me, and that meant we would all be starting off the evening with bad moods.

  


Good. Fair footing.

  


"Papa?" I called.

  


"In the kitchen," he replied, and there was a stiffness to his voice that warned me I was about to miss a month's free time. 

  


I made my way in slowly, taking in deep breaths to find my center. I needed to calm down, I told myself.

  


Launching into a hysterical rage would be highly counterproductive and only put my parents on firmer footing. 

  


Papa was kneeling at the table, turning a cup of tea between his hands. I looked at him for a second before taking the place across from him. I didn't lower my head submissively, but rather stared at his face directly. The room wasn't well lit, and his dark coloring was made more ominous by the shadows cast from the two lamps in the corner. "Where were you?" he asked softly.

  


"Haru picked me up from school, saying we had to talk," I told him softly, and the very lack of expression in my voice was more telling than anything else I could have done.

  


Papa's fingers turned white around the cup from gripping it so hard. "What did he tell you?"

  


"Many things, but what he showed me was perhaps the most important. I figured most of it out on my own earlier." I ran my hands through my hair, letting the golden strands fall forward over my shoulders. "I always thought I was lucky, to have inherited Mama's hair. It's so unusual in Japan, being a blonde. I wondered why I never noticed Momiji had the same color?" 

  


Papa set aside his cup, but it seemed like a burden had been lifted from his shoulders. "He told you everything?"

  


"He told me what he could, what he knew. Haru told me that Mama had her memory erased, which made most of the missing pieces fit. But why would she do that, I wondered?" I tossed my head, sending my hair cascading back in an eye-catching array. "Then Haru hugged me, and it became more clear."

  


He winced. "Haru... I never would have foreseen Haru getting involved until recently." He spoke in an undertone, as if the admission was something I wasn't supposed to hear but decided to answer anyway.

  


"I'm glad he did it." I almost told him of Momiji's reaction and what Yuki and Kyou had done afterwards, but I decided not to. Explaining anything would lesson my position of power. "Why, Papa? Why did you not keep Momiji? Why did you let Hatori erase Mama's memory?" I demanded.

  


Papa was silent, then he rose to his feet, coming around the table to he was kneeling next to me. "Momo, this is something that you can't begin to understand. It's something that..."

  


"Why can't I? You kept me and my brother apart my entire life! You rejected him!" I accused, flaring up. "You are horrible!"

  


"I never rejected Momiji! Momiji and I have always maintained a close relationship!" Papa snapped back almost instantly, and there was something fierce in his eyes, something I had only seen the time I had been in the hospital with a broken arm and the doctors had placed me in the waiting room. "I did everything I could for Momiji!"

  


"Why did you let Mama forget?"

  


"Because it was for the best," he whispered. "It was my fault. When she married into the clan, I didn't tell her about the curse because I didn't think it could possibly happen to us, having a cursed child, I mean. But it did - we had Momiji. He was born two months early, like all the cursed children, although I hoped he was only a premature baby. Then your mother hugged him and he transformed."

  


I wanted to ask what my brother's curse was, since Papa would know, but I remembered Haru had told me it was rude to ask what another's curse was and Yuki had told me to ask Momiji himself. I wasn't stupid enough to defy the clan head.

  


Papa, though, was lost in his memories. His face, still cast in those shadows, was lined with anguish. "Her scream lingers in my nightmares. I'll never forget it... a long, piercing wail of denial that echoed through the delivery room. It was at the Sohma hospital, though, so it was ignored. People knew that another of the Jyuunishi had been born."

  


"If it's only about being not able to hug him, why couldn't she accept it?" I asked icily.

  


"It is a terrible thing. Imagine not being able to touch a member of the opposite gender, for fear of being bumped into. Imagine never being able touch your mother. Imagine fearing illness, for being sick causes you to transform. Imagine this... then imagine the lives of the parents who shelter the child. Imagine a mother who believes she has given birth to something not quite human." 

  


"That was Mama?"

  


"She called him an It, and was unable to stand being around him. Your Mama wasn't a strong woman to start with, but she got sick, and seemed to forget how to smile. I... I had to choose, Momo. Her life, or take the chance that she may accept Momiji someday..."

  


"Why? Why did you...." I whispered.

  


Papa's hands rested in his lap, but the knuckles were white from where he was holding onto the black fabric of his dress pants. "I've never heard of a mother accepting a Jyunishi after she's rejected the child. So I talked to Momiji, and we decided to take her to Hatori and help her forget him."

  


"You talked to Momiji?" I gasped. I hadn't realized that Momiji had been party to the decision.

  


"I did," he answered steadily. "Hw was four, and maybe he didn't understand what was going on, but I think he got most of it. Cursed children grow up faster than most."

  


A four year old? "So... you just gave him up after she forgot?"

  


"There was an emptiness in her face when she saw him, and it scared Momiji. I didn't realize it would be there, but Hatori had warned me. So I let Momiji live with the inner clan, and eventually your Mama could smile again. And then we had you, and it seemed like her heart had been repaired.

  


Repaired, but at what cost? I wondered. A thought occurred to me, and it turned my blood to ice even as the words tripped out over my tongue. "What if I had been cursed?" I whispered. "What would you have done if you couldn't have held me?"

  


Papa's hands shook . "That wouldn't have happened. That... wouldn't have happened."

  


"Is it impossible for two children to be cursed in the same immediate family?" I asked.

  


"No," he said. "Ayame and Yuki are both cursed. But you wouldn't have been cursed." He said this with true conviction.

  


"How do you know?" I demanded. "It could have happened!"

  


"You were planned," Papa told me. His eyes were bleak as he stared at me. "I planned it so that you wouldn't be born until after the last of the youngest Jyunishi was."

  


"Huh?" I couldn't think of anything more intelligent to say.

  


"After Momiji was born, I sat down and figured it out. Why... how? I wanted to see if there were any patterns, see why it had happened to my son, and no one else's... and the answer was that Momiji was simply born at the wrong time. Had he been born three weeks later, your cousin Sana would have been cursed, and he would have been normal. So I tried to figure our how your mother and I could have a child, since she wanted one. She didn't remember Momiji, and she wanted to have a child."

  


"How could you justify giving her a child, knowing what she had done to the first? Rejecting Momiji? What if..."

  


Papa looked at me with clear, cold eyes, and I saw someone there that frightened me. Someone ruthless, someone cold. Suddenly I realized how he could be the head of a multinational corporation, how he could allow Momiji to be given away, how he could justify mother's escape from her memory. He would stop at nothing to protect what he wanted, and damn the consequences. He reached out and tilted my chin back, using the same type of grip Haru had used to keep me from looking away from an unpleasant truth. "I figured out how to avoid the curse."

  


"How?" I demanded.

  


"The Jyunishi cycles. Every generation has its own Jyunishi and God. The cycle for this Jyunishi began with the birth of Sohma Hatori, followed by Ayame and Shigure. The generations are closely linked - even if one of the Jyunishi is killed by accident, the flow of time will correct itself within a cycle or two - that animal will either become very long-lived or accident prone. That's why the Jyunishi are all within fifteen years of each other right now."

  


"So what does that have to do with me?" I demanded.

  


Papa released my chin. "I waited until the cycle was complete. When Sohma Hiro was born, and cursed with the Ram, I knew the chances of you being cursed were minute. All the curses had been claimed for this generation, barring accident."

  


It was such a methodological, cold way to bring me into the world. "You're ruthless," I said. 

  


"After what happened to Momiji, can you blame me?" my father asked. His eyes were dark and remorseless, though I saw tension along his jaw line. "I had lost one child through my arrogance. I was not about to lose another."

  


I was seeing a side of my father I didn't like. I had been wrong to ever think of him as weak. He was cold and calculating, like so many in our family. This side of him was one I did not like. "Papa... if you regret Momiji so much, why didn't you ever try to do anything to make it up to him?"

  


"I did my best. Members of the family have looked after him, and I've always met him every Saturday after school for lunch, until he went to college. He'd stop by my office for a while, and I'd did my best to attend his events and parties... sometimes they clashed with events your mother was holding, and I couldn't make it. But he knew I loved him. Momiji is a perceptive person."

  


Yes, he was, I thought, and my hands clenched. I wondered how many times Papa had chosen one of my events over Momiji's, or had chosen to spend time with his "real" family instead of his son. My heart ached with pain for my older brother, so long left on his own. It wasn't fair to either of us, to have been denied each other's company. "You love me more than you love Momiji, don't you?" I asked.

  


"Of course not! I love you equally! It's just I get to express it with you, you just don't understand how it is, how it was... what there is between us." Papa looked pained, and he shut his eyes before taking a deep breath. "Momiji is the greatest regret of my life," he admitted to me. "If I could do it all differently, I might, but we can't change the past. Whenever I see him, I hurt. I hurt for him, I hurt for your mother, I hurt for myself."

  


This was not the father I loved. This could not be the proud, strong man who always seemed to have the world under his control, and be capable of fixing everything. I was losing him, losing my faith in his abilities, and I was angry at him for it. I wanted to hurt him. "What about me?" I snapped. "If I'm so precious to you, didn't it ever occur to you that I'd want to know my older brother?" I asked. I clenched my fists to my side, trying to keep from lashing out physically as well. 

  


He flinched. "Of course it did!" he said, and his voice cracked. "I thought about it every time you turned your head a certain way, every time you laughed! Your voices sound the same! But some things just can't be. You can't understand..."

  


"Because I'm not cursed? Neither are you!"

  


It happened too fast for me to follow.

  


CRASH!

  


The sound of glass shattered, then a sudden pain in my cheek as a something sliced through it. Papa's horrified realization that he had hurt me, however inadvertently. On the floor by the wall was the remnants of the shattered teacup he had thrown in his rage, unable to think of anything to do in his defense against my honesty.

  


I stared at him in surprise, though I knew I had pushed him to it. "Ouch," I said calmly, unable to think of anything else. My hand came to my cheek, coming away with the red stickiness of blood. The cut was a shallow one, and I knew it would heal without much effort, but he had inflicted it on me. Through his loss of control, my father had hurt me.

  


His hands shook as they came towards me, obviously wanting to inspect the damage. His face was colorless, but I flinched away. My eyes didn't waver as I drew back from him, though a large part of me just wanted to run up to my room and start bawling. I was determined to see this through. 

  


"Momo..." he said. "I'm so sorry. Let's get it cleaned."

  


My fingers fell away, but I knew I would be feeling the phantom pain of that cut for years to come, long after it healed.. We had crossed a line, drawn our sides, and we weren't in the same place anymore. We had lashed out at each other, and though I knew we would reconcile, someday, I didn't see it happening anytime soon. Things would never be the same, and I mourned for my innocence. I knew he could betray a child now. What would he have done, had I been born cursed?

  


"I'm going to go clean this on my own." I took a deep breath. "Otousan, I don't want to talk to you anymore right now. I... I want my brother. I don't know what kind of person he really is, but I don't think he'd hurt me. You..." I looked at him, shaking my head, unable to bring my feelings to words. "I don't think I want to talk to you anytime soon."

  


Papa had aged during our argument, and as I looked at him, I thought I saw the beginnings of wrinkles form around the corners of his eyes. It took a moment for me to get up the willpower to leave, but I turned to go.

  


"Momo?"

  


"Yes, Otousan?" I replied, not turning to face him.

  


I could picture his wince. I had always used "papa" instead of the Japanese "Otousan" and I knew he felt the barrier between us rise. "What are you going to tell your mother?"

  


"Nothing," I replied. "I don't think I want to speak to her, either."

  


"Momo..." he whispered, struggling to find the words. I hesitated on the threshold, hoping he'd say something to make it all better, but knowing he wouldn't. "There was no right answer at that time. Sometimes in this life, there is no absolute truth, and you choose what will hurt the fewest people. Momoji may hurt, but wouldn't her hurt more if you okaasan had died?"

  


I raced out of the room. I had had it with his excuses.

  


As I lay on my bed that night, I wondered if my mother would question the change in me. I knew I wouldn't be able to look at her the same way, knowing she could forget a child, forget my brother, because the sight of him disgusted her...

  


Would they have forgotten me, had I been the cursed one? It was on that discomforting thought that I slipped into the oblivion of sleep.

  


When I woke up the next morning, I felt as though I hadn't slept at all. I had spent the night tossing and turning, and it hadn't been restful. I washed up and brushed my hair before putting my uniform on. I really didn't want to go to school, but I wanted to stay home even less. 

  


Mama was downstairs, humming as she cooked breakfast. "Are eggs okay, Momo?" she asked me. She was fond of western breakfasts due to her German origin.

  


I looked at her, dressed in the "Kiss the Cook" apron and neat clothes and wondered how she could live with herself. Didn't she know something had been missing from her life? "Just toast," I told her.

  


"Are you sure?" she asked as I went to pour myself a glass of milk.

  


"Yes." 

  


She cocked an eyebrow curiously. Usually I was bubbly with plans for the day, eager to share confidences with her, but today I was moody and sullen, and keeping to myself. She stared at me long and hard and I knew she wanted to ask me what was wrong, but her instincts warned her I would bite her head off if she tried. 

  


She set the toast in front of me, and was about to turn away when she noticed the long, thin scratch on my face. "Momo... what happened?" she asked, pointing to it.

  


"I got cut. It's nothing."

  


Papa shifted uneasily in his chair. He was eating his meal with little appetite. I noticed him poking at the omelette and stared at him with hard eyes. He ruffled the newspapers before him a bit before looking at me. His eyes were measuring and I knew we weren't going to be comfortable around each other for ages. "Are you going to do anything after school today?" he asked after a second.

  


"Maybe, maybe not," I answered noncommittally.

  


Mama added orange juice to my meal. "You have to be more specific than that, Momo," she told me. "We need to keep track of your whereabouts."

  


"Yes, keeping track of children is something parents are responsible for," I said softly, my very lack of expression more cutting than a rage would have been. 

  


Papa just stared at me, not missing my point. "Momo, this is not the time or place."

  


"It never is," I said. Rising to my feet, I stared at my parents. "I'm going to leave now."

  


"This early?" Mama asked in surprise. She looked at me, then at my father, sensing something was intensely wrong and having no clue how to fix it.

  


"I have things..." I started to say, but was interrupted by the sharp chime of the telephone.

  


Papa reached over blindly and picked it up. I was about to use it as a chance to escape, but something made me pause. "Sohma residence. Yes? Yes... no, he hasn't. No... I don't think... yes, I knew. Yes, she spoke to me... I'll let you know." Papa set the phone down, staring at me, and I could see he was trying to decide whether or not to tell me some bad news. 

  


"You'd better let me know," I said. "No more secrets, Papa."

  


Mother watched both of us, nibbling on her lip, but we ignored her. This was Sohma business, and as Haru had told me on the night of the engagement party, Mama could never be one of us.

  


I was Sohma. I would know the truth.

  


Papa nodded slowly, bowing his head in resignation. "That was Hatori. Momiji is missing. It seems no one has seen him since last night."

  


END PART SEVEN 

  


~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

  


Author's Notes:

  


Teenage rebellion - gotta love it! Now, Momo may have had a better REASON than most, but getting into a brew ha ha with her tousan...

  


And Momiji is missing. ^_~ Ain't that just a cliffhanger worthy of the EMSiT name from my Sailor Moon days?

  


Credit as always to Xandra for the beta, and Merrow for the discussion and keeping me from walking TOO much in Momo's head.

  



	8. Momiji

Aishuu Offers:

Secrets of the Sohma

mbsilvana@yahoo.com

Disclaimers: Not mine.

  
  


*****

  


Part Eight: Momiji

  


*****

  


I wanted to skip class and immediately hunt for Momiji, but my better instincts got hold of me for the first time in weeks. So instead I gave my parents a rather chill goodbye, grabbed my school bag and went to classes.

  


I really shouldn't have bothered. 

  


I didn't learn anything, but spent the entire day worrying. Girls were pestering me about Haru's visit the day before, and needless to say, it wasn't anything I wanted to talk about. The repercussions of Haru's actions yesterday were life-changing, and I didn't want to fend off his fangirls. I actually snapped at one of them who tried to get me to tell her about his hair. This was unlike me; usually I would be polite, but with my mind entirely on where Momiji was, I was in no mood for the sheer idiocy.

  


Time dragged on, and it seemed like the final bell was always two hours out of reach. Finally it did come, and I quickly raced into the hall, pulling my cellphone out of my backpack and activating it. I wasn't allowed to keep it on during school hours, but Papa might have called and left a message....

  


Nothing.

  


It was with reluctance that I called my father.

  


"Any news?" I asked, not even bothering with a hello.

  


Father was quiet for a long moment. "No. The inner circle is searching for him, but if he doesn't want to be found, he won't be. Momiji knows how to hide."

  


I thought for a moment, trying to decide what to do. Logically, there wasn't much a thirteen year old girl could do, but my stubborn nature wouldn't agree to that. I should go home....

  


"I'm going to the Main Compound," I said. "I'll see what people know, and if there's anything I can do."

  


"Momo-" my father began to object.

  


"I'll stay at Haru's or something if I need somewhere to spend the night," I said impulsively. "I'm sure someone will feed me."

  


"Momo, you have school..."

  


"Not until I get this resolved, I don't," I told him, thinking how useless I had been today. "I'll be home tomorrow. I hope they find Momiji today, because I need to talk to him."

  


"Your mother-"

  


"Tell her there's a family function. It's not far from the truth," I said. "I've got to go." I hung up before he could get another word in, then turned it off. There was no way I was going to let him get in the way. He could, of course, call the compound and have them drag me back, but I doubted that catching a misbehaving teenager would be high on their priorities at the moment.

  


The main house was a long way from my school, and I was forced to take the subway. I didn't like doing it, finding the unbearably cramped conditions forced me to hunch my shoulders and shrink into the seat I had been lucky enough to snag. I made myself as small as possible, but I felt overwhelmed and on the verge of hyperventilating.

  


The trip was a too long, giving me time to stew on exactly what I was doing. I was getting myself in big, big trouble. My father and mother would be so angry at me for acting up - and I could never explain to my mother why. And... would Momiji want anything to do with me? Maybe he had run away to keep away from me?

  


When I arrived at the stop, I pushed my way through the crowd. The walk from the station was about ten blocks, and I knew the compound was large enough that I could spend quite a while wandering it before finding any of the main clan. 

  


The doors were just as impressive as I remembered. They didn't seem as scary as they once had, because I was a Sohma. I knew the truth they had been built to conceal.

  


I tossed my head back and marched resolutely inside. I would go see Yuki, and if he wasn't there, Kyou. They seemed to have a good idea what was going on.

  


As I wandered through, I was struck by how empty the large buildings seemed. Hundreds of people had to live within these walls, but it seemed like no one was around... nearly impossible. Everyone couldn't be out searching for one stray Sohma, so where were they?

  


It was incredibly lonely. My hands trembled, but suddenly a voice rose on the wind, singing a simple melody that braced my spirits, assuring me I had not entered some kind of twilight zone.

  


_Yuhi you yamani_

_Teru-Teru Momiji_

_Kaeru yatokage ga_

_Kon'nichi wa_

  


It was an odd song... Strangely childish and innocent. Then the words hit me, and I wondered if the singer meant something special by them. Was it the singer's way of searching for my missing brother?

  


I raced around the house from where they came from, wanting to know who had been singing. The voice was familiar, but I had met so many people recently that I couldn't pin it down exactly. The afternoon was warm against my skin and the song made me feel that maybe things would work out alright.

  


I rounded a corner and blinked, surprised to find myself in Hatori's backyard and even more surprised that Honda Tohru was there, hanging out the laundry. She was singing to herself, her long brown hair tied back in a kerchief that matched the practical, yet feminine, clothing she wore. I had always seen her besides Yuki, which usually made her fade into the background beside his extraordinary looks. 

  


Now I felt shy and gawky beside her. Most people assumed I was quite ladylike, with my beauty and natural grace, but Tohru seemed to epitomize everything it meant to be a woman. As she worked, hanging out sheets, she seemed unconcerned that I was watching her. She repeated the song again, her sweet voice gentle and reassuring.

  


I just stared at her, wishing I knew why I was there when I should be out with the rest of the cousins, looking for my brother. "Um, hi..." I said finally.

  


"EEK!" Tohru yelped, whirling around. Her calm was shattered easily as I spoke, and she stumbled as she jumped a bit from surprise, managing to land in the half-full laundry basket, which was full of wet things.

  


I raced forward to help her, but only succeeded in tripping and landing on top of her in my haste. A hot flush came to my cheeks as I stared into her face as we sat together. If she had been one of the Jyunishi males, I most certainly would have triggered her curse.

  


She, however, merely started laughing. "Hello, Momo-chan!" she said between giggles.

  


I stared into her warm blue eyes and started laughing as well. The situation was funny, and I had been so tense since Momiji had vanished that I needed the laughter. I felt the anger that had been simmering inside me since I had fought with Papa level off; not vanish, but soothed. "I'm sorry, Tohru-san."

  


"It's okay!" she assured me. "I'm a klutz... Kyou-kun is always telling me that."

  


I realized we were still sitting in wet laundry, and her clothes had to be getting damp. Blushing even more brightly, I scurried backwards without getting to my feet so she could extract herself. "I'm so sorry! You're all wet now..."

  


"It's fine!" She smiled and managed to rise, smiling down at me. Tohru extended a fine-boned hand to help me rise. "How about we go get something to drink?" she offered. "I made some lemonade."

  


I nodded. "What are you doing here?" I asked.

  


"Hatori-san needs someone to do his spring cleaning, and I volunteered. He's looked after me so many times when I was sick that I thought I'd return the favor," Tohru explained.

  


"Is Hatori-san here?" I asked, glancing around. I wanted to ask if he had any more information on Momiji, since I was here. 

  


Tohru's eyes darkened a bit, and her smile faded. "No. He's looking for..."

  


"My brother," I said softly.

  


Tohru nodded, tucking a strand of her long brown hair behind her ear. "Hatori and Momiji are close; Hatori raised him, practically, though Momiji lived with different family members."

  


"Do... Do you think they'll find him?"

  


Tohru nodded her head so rapidly I wondered if she was making herself dizzy. "Certainly! But.." Her smile vanished entirely and she arranged herself over on the porch. "They'll find him when he's ready to be found, not before."

  


"Do you know him well?" I had to ask.

  


She placed her hands on her knees and looked over at me. "Momiji is like a ray of sunshine," she told me. "The first time I met him, it was like meeting an old friend - he's always been there to cheer me up."

  


"So you're close?" 

  


She thought on it. "Yes. As close as you can ever be to a Jyunishi... There's a part of their heart they lock away, and it takes a special someone to find the key."

  


I wanted to ask her another question, but she merely smiled at me. It filled me with warmth. She seemed to know what I wanted to ask before I could voice it, and it prevented me from having to say my fears aloud. 

  


Impulsively I leaned forward and hugged her, and her arms came around me naturally. She hardly knew me, but her hug was like coming home. Her scent, strawberry and clean air, wrapped around me comfortingly, and I indulged in it before pulling back.

  


"I need to keep looking..." I said.

  


She looked at me seriously, and in her eyes, I saw an old soul. "Once upon a time, another member of the Jyunishi ran away when his curse was too much for him to bear," she told me.

  


"What happened?" I asked.

  


"A girl brought him back, because she loved him. She was able to accept his curse, even though she was afraid," Tohru said softly. 

  


"Did the girl and the Jyunishi live happily ever after?"

  


"Well, they seem to be. Each of them has found the one they want to love best, but they'll always be special to each other. The girl thinks the bond she formed with him is as precious as the one she has with her future husband."

  


Her words gave me hope. I would find Momiji. I started to turn away, but Tohru placed a hand on my shoulder. "Can you wait just a bit? I still have that lemonade, and I think I have an idea," she told me."

  


****

  


Before I left, Tohru gave me some final advice. "Why do we always find things in the last place we look?" she asked.

  


I thought on it. I had heard a variation of it before... "Because then we stop looking."

  


"It's a good riddle, isn't it? It was one of my mother's favorites," she told me. "So where's the last place you'd look?"

  


I knew then where Momiji had to be. "Thanks, oneesan!" I told her, giving her another hug, more for my sake than for hers. She was just one of the most huggable people I had ever met.

  


It was nearly dark when I made my way back to the bridge where the fantastic fight had occurred yesterday. No one would think of searching for him here, or if they had, he had probably avoided them.

  


I had a secret weapon, one which Momiji wouldn't be able to resist. I nearly trip twice on the river back before arriving beside the bridge. Quietly I began to sing:

  


_Sunset on the Mountain_

_Come out, Come Momiji_

_Frogs and Lizards say_

_Hello_

  


"Where did you learn that?" a soft voice said, sounding shell-shocked.

  


I turned around, swinging my hands behind my back and leaning forward on my toes. "I learned it from Tohru-neesan, of course," I said. "She said it'd help call you to me, and she was right."

  


Momiji appeared from under the bridge, and I almost cried at the sight of him. His amber eyes, the same eyes we had both inherited from our mother I recognized now, were almost black in a face that was the color of pale ivory. His lips were nearly bloodless and I wondered why it seemed like a strong gust of wind could carry him away. He was heartbreakingly beautiful, but his beauty seemed to have been that of a china doll which had been dropped on the floor and shattered; tragic and somehow lovely, but untouchable for fear of cutting myself. I hoped I had the right glue to repair him, but I feared I didn't.

  


"Tohru-san knows me well... I heard you singing my song, and I thought she had come looking for me," he whispered, and he stared up at the trees around us.

  


"Your song?" I echoed.

  


"She didn't tell you? I made it up when I was fifteen." He seemed to be speaking from a long ways off, divorced from his emotions. "She and I sung it together, and I thought it was her singing it..."

  


"Everyone is looking for you, Momiji..." I said softly, dropping the honorific. "Why would you come to Tohru and no one else?"

  


He was still distance. "Because she was the first one to ever hug me, knowing what it meant. Because she accepts us all, knowing the curse. Because she lets me cry."

  


I went over to him then, but he shrank back. "Momiji... We need to talk."

  


"Momo- I-"

  


"I know you're cursed..."

  


"That would be a logical conclusion, wouldn't it? I assume they explained the Jyunishi to you?" he asked. His eyes were shadowed. "Did they tell you which curse I bear?"

  


"No. I don't really care." I stared at him angrily.

  


"You're so angry... About being lied to about the curse, about being kept in the dark."

  


"Well, I can understand why I wasn't told about the curse... But I don't understand why I was never told you were my brother!" I snapped. Round two, Black Momo!

  


Momiji's eyes widened. "I- Mama couldn't accept me, so-"

  


"I just went over this with Papa! I AM NOT OUR MOTHER!" I said. I glared at him fiercely, marching over to him. He stood stock-still in shock as I grabbed him in a bear-hug.

  


POOF!

  


Momiji's clothes scattered around us, and I stared through the smoke, blinking a bit as I held onto the small rabbit that was frozen against me. His fur was amazingly soft as I held his cream-colored body tight to my chest. "You're so soft," I whispered to him. "A rabbit suits you.... I should have guessed."

  


I was right. He was rabbit-like- quick movements full of nervous energy, always on the alert for trouble, shy in a strange way, yet warm and lovable. I stroked his back gently, wondering what to do next. I had accepted him... Would he be able to take the next step?

  


His body was rigid, feeling like rigor mortis had set in. My breath stilled as he spoke. "Momo..." he said softly. 

  


"I can't pretend to understand what it means to be cursed. I can't pretend to know your pain... But I want to know what it means to be your sister. I want to be your family..." I whispered to him.

  


It seemed like forever before he relaxed, but it finally happened. "I... I wanted to know you..."

  


"I don't care what anyone else says. They can't take us away from each other unless we let them," I told him.

  


He didn't reply, but that was okay. We merely stayed together without speaking, content in the other's presence. Our life was going to get complicated, but from that moment on, we would have each other.

  


And at that moment, that was all that mattered.

  


END PART EIGHT

  
  


Notes: Credit to Xannee for betaing, and to animelyrics.com, where I borrowed the verse of Teru Teru Momiji. One more part!


	9. Sohmas

 SEQ CHAPTER \h \r 1Aishuu Offers:

Secrets of the Sohma

~ A Fruits Basket Fanfiction ~

Disclainer: Not Mine

Notes: Now Complete. For Skittles1, who I can always count on. I really appreciate you. Thanks to the beloved imouto, Lyra, for the help.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Epilogue: Sohmas

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

It had been a year since I had found out Momiji was my brother; a glorious, terrifying year. Most people would think this story would have a happily ever after, but that's not the way of the Sohma family.

Perhaps that is our true secret; we don't know what happiness is. Momiji and I were learning what contentment was. Maybe that's all we could hope for. 

Momiji hadn't forgiven Haru for his manipulations; I hadn't forgiven my parents. Each of us was uncomfortable about it, because I was learning to love Haru as a second brother, one who understood that wilder side I had unleashed on my father that day, while Momiji wished I would forgive Mama. Both of us would cheerfully hang our Papa out to dry. Haru had been right about Papa being weak, and I couldn't accept it. Momiji was more forgiving, of course, but I knew that he resented him.

Today, though, I wasn't dwelling on what was wrong with my life. Today was going to be one of the happiest days the family had known, because today Yuki and Tohru were getting married.

There had been a ton of preparations going on, with the entire family planning on going. Papa and Mama had declined, so Haru was going to pick me up and escort me. Momiji wasn't comfortable being around either of our parents.

When the doorbell rang, I ran to get it. My father had made himself scarce, obviously not wanting to encounter my cousin, who had little use for him, and my mother was in the kitchen.

Haru stood outside, dressed in a haori, the dark material making his white hair stand out brilliantly.

"Haru?" I said. I looked at him, surprised to see him wearing such a traditional garment. I had been expecting him to be wearing a suit at best, though if I had thought on it, I would have imagined more outrageous formal wear for him. Traditional and Haru didn't belong in the same sentence. 

"You're beautiful tonight." He smiled at me gently, and I reflected that he was gorgeous himself. 

It was too bad that he was head over heels in love with someone who didn't love him. From which Kagura-neesan told me, this was the third time it had happened, but it was the first that the object of Haru's affections actively detested him. I wondered about that. Hate was the flip side of love, and all those cliches, so for Momiji to hate him that much meant that he probably did love him.

"You're handsome as well... But I was expecting you to wear something a little less..." I paused, trying to find the right word that wasn't insulting.

"Traditional?" he replied, and he laughed. "Sometimes the best way to shock people is to be conventional. Besides, it's Yuki's wedding, and I don't want to do anything to get him riled. It's his day."

I giggled. It was hard for me to picture Yuki as being riled, but Haru and Momiji had both let hints drop that the clan head had a temper to rival Kyou's - it was just more slow burning. "It is! I bet Tohru is going to be a beautiful bride!"

"She'll look as pretty as her husband," Haru said as he took my hand in his and started to tug me down the walk towards the car he had waiting there.

It was on the tip of my tongue to say something in Tohru's defense about how the bride was always the most beautiful person on her wedding day, but I knew I would be lying. Yuki's beauty was the kind that took people's breath away. Haru's words were actually a sort of back-handed compliment.

I studied his face, wondering if he resented Tohru. I knew that he'd been in love with Yuki at one point, and it would be natural enough for him to feel residual feelings towards the Mouse. Haru's face, though, was wearing its usual slight smile, which could mean any number of things.

I hated that. Trying to read his expression was like trying to speak learn Chinese from take out menus. It didn't work.

I was a bit too far out of the family line to be invited to attend the wedding itself, but Haru dropped me off at the Kekkon Hiroen, promising he'd be back as soon as the wedding was over. The ceremony was taking place inside the main house, and from what I could tell, only the Jyunishi had been invited. 

I gave over the oshugi my father had sent with me, smiling as I wandered deeper into the party. The stage where Tohru and Yuki would sit, but as I looked for my name on the table, I was surprised that I had been placed close to the couple, right beside my brother.

It was great. Dinner would be wonderful, I knew, and the celebration would be even better. I nibbled my lip as I slid into my seat at the nearly empty table, knowing that I was a bit early, but that gave me the perfect opportunity to watch the other guests arrive.

The Sohma clan was massive, and when Tohru's friends were added to the mix, my head spun. There were probably three hundred people at the celebration, and I couldn't wait to see everyone. People slowly trickled in, and I smiled as a few waved to me, and a couple others came over to offer me their best wishes.

It was such a change from last year. 

Forty-five minutes passed without incident, as I rose to mingle with some of the family members I knew well, but then a hand fell on my shoulder, causing me to jump out of my skin slightly. I turned around quickly, seeing who had been so forward.

It was Ayame.  Ayame, who I never knew how to understand. Usually he would be laughing brightly, a figure larger than life, but occasionally I would see bursts of the same sorrow that marked the others who bore the curse. He was unrestrained, untamed, so many "un" words that it made my head hurt trying to come up with adjectives. His wife, Mine, encouraged him to plunge headfirst into chaos, rather than hold him back. The only one who had any luck at all keeping him in line was Hatori, and that was just barely.

I wondered if it was by chance that Mine was over with Ritsu, while Shigure and Hatori were with Ayame right now.

"Ayame-san!" I said. "It's been a while!" I smiled a bit at him, though I knew that I was going to need to find a quiet corner to recuperate after he was done with me.

"Momo, my beautiful little fruit!" he exclaimed, and he picked me up by the waist, whirling me around a few times so I was slightly dizzy as he set me down. I wobbled a bit on my feet, but Shigure steadied me by placing a hand on my shoulder, watching Ayame's antics with an indulgent smile. Hatori was quiet as well, so I knew that they were going to let Ayame get away with tormenting me so he'd leave Yuki alone on his wedding day. "You haven't been to my shop! That means I haven't been able to make you an outfit to suit your loveliness!"

Just my luck. I liked Ayame, but I liked him a lot more from across the room.

"Um..." I said, trying to think of an excuse. The truth was, I had heard rumors of what Ayame did for a living, and I wasn't sure if it was safe to visit him. I mean... He designed clothes for cross-dressers. 

"Momo-chan is very busy at school," Shigure said. "Besides, she's not your sister."

Ayame seemed to sober at that before tilting my head to consider me. "No... She's not." He seemed melancholy. "I wonder how different it would have been, if Yuki had been more like her."

Shigure smiled at me. "Momo-chan is unique, no?"

As I looked around, I realized that almost all of the Jyunishi had finally arrived. "How was the wedding?" I asked.

Ayame practically swooned, fanning himself. "Oh, they looked so beautiful! Tohru and Yuki are simply splendid together - their clothes were just perfect! Of course they were, since I designed them!"

Hatori gave a tired sigh, and I turned my attention to the tall, stoic doctor. "Where are they?"

"Tohru's changing into her next outfit, and Yuki's waiting for her," he said. "When they get here, we'll start the banquet."

I nodded, feeling excited. I wanted to see what Tohru would be wearing, and I was sure that Yuki would be looking at her in that special way that made me believe that there really was "true love" in the world.

"I'm sure the food is going to be good!" a voice said from beside me, and there was my brother, grinning at me. "Can I escort my princess back to her seat?" he asked.

I nodded, and he took my hand happily. We were very fond of holding hands, since I couldn't hug him without him turning into a rabbit - not that that stopped me all the time, since I knew he loved to be held. We said goodbye to the others, and Momiji helped me weave through the crowd, which seemed immense and pressing now that the Jyunishi had arrived.

Our seats were comfortable, and I shifted a bit as Kisa took the seat next to me. Her smile was sweet, but seconds later Hiro was by her side, and I gave him a smile. I liked his sarcastic attitude, and was learning to give as good as I got. Of course, Momiji hated it when I got confrontational. He really did have one of the sweetest personalities.

"Ayame said the wedding went well," I said to my brother, who was toying with the glass of water on the table, swirling it slightly.

"Oh, it was fun!" Momiji said, and proceeded to fill me in on how nice everyone had been, smiling as he mentioned that Kyou had wished Yuki and Tohru the best.

I wondered how much he was paraphrasing. Yuki and Kyou got along like oil and water, always able to make the other's hackles rise. They didn't fight - not the way they did in the stories Haru told me - but I was willing to wager that Kyou had said something nice to Tohru, and threatened Yuki in the process. I hid a smile behind my hand, watching for Tohru and Yuki.

After a few more minutes, and most of the guests had settled down, they appeared, holding hands. Tohru was wearing a pristine white gown which whispered softly as she moved, while Yuki's haoiri-hakama provided a subtle backdrop for his new wife. Yuki was still stunningly beautiful, the way I remembered him, but today there seemed to be something more. Every time he looked at Tohru, his eyes practically glowed, and I could see the tight grip he kept on her fingers.

That was what love was, I knew. Tohru and Yuki were in love, because they wanted to be with each other most of all. I wondered how much it hurt Tohru, to know she would never be able to hug her husband, but there seemed to be no shadows lingering in her eyes.

I wanted that for myself, and for Momiji. I wanted someone to love him like that. At the other end of the table, I knew, Haru was sitting with some other cousins, carefully kept apart from Momiji by the wedding arrangers. No one wanted another family incident to besmirch the day.

Still, I hurt for my brother. There seemed to be no end to the pain that he knew. Truly the Jyunishi were cursed.

Momiji, though, was in an effervescent mood, bubbling like the champagne he was sipping at. He had barely had a half glass, but his eyes seemed brighter, and I wondered if he was one of those people who couldn't hold his liquor. My eyes must have betrayed my doubt, because he gave me another one of his brilliant smiles. "I'm okay, Momo. It's just that everyone here is so happy that I can't help but feel that was as well."

I smiled, and watched as tables were pushed aside for dancing. Yuki and Tohru were going to stay up on their dais and watch the fun, but I was relieved that I would be able to move finally. Sitting still for so long, even next to Momiji, was making me antsy.

He noticed me looking around, and gave me another one of those smiles I found so sweet. "Are you going to dance?" he asked.

"In a bit," I said. "Will you dance with me?"

"Always," he agreed. "You're my princess, after all!"

"Haru brought me here, so I should dance with him first," I said, nibbling on my fingernail. 

Momiji took my hands away from my mouth, but a certain hardness came to his eyes. "I guess that would be polite," he said. "Come and find me when you=re done, okay?"

I sighed. I was getting very tired of his coldness to Haru, but whenever I tried to bring it up, he'd either pretend nothing was wrong, or tell me that I shouldn't mess with his affairs. "Fine, fine," I said, even though I wasn't agreeing.

"I'm sorry, Momo," he said. "I'm going to go talk to Tohru, and wish her the best. Sohma Tohru! Doesn't that sound funny?" he asked, but there was a wistfulness in his voice. 

Finding Haru was easy. He was still seated, patiently listening to Ritsu ramble off all of the things he had done wrong that day. His placid face tilted up as he crooked an eyebrow to acknowledge my presence, but otherwise he kept his attention on Ritsu.

"...I almost tripped over Kagura, which would have been a disaster, since she was wearing such a pretty kimono, and when I went to apologize, Kyou told me to just go away, and then I bumped into one of the caterers, and that's why the tray was missing two canapés, since they fell on the ground, and..."

Honestly, Ritsu was one of the most accident prone people I have ever met. Sometimes I thought that if he wasn't so highly strung, he'd be a lot happier.

"Um, Haru-niisama?" I said finally, when it became clear that Haru was just going to let Ritsu continue to babble.

"Oh! I'm in the way! I'm so sorry, Momo-chan! I'm-"

I shook my head quickly, holding my hands up to stem the stream of absolutions. "It's okay, Ritsu-niisan. I just came over to see if Haru wanted to dance." I felt a bit guilty over cutting in on their conversation. "Um... and would you dance with me, a bit later?"

Ritsu's face exploded into a beautiful smile, and I felt myself returning one. Really, he was quite handsome when he wasn't apologizing. "I'd love to! But... I hope I don't step on your feet and-"

 "I'll be okay! I assured him. Glancing over at Haru, I tilted my head toward the dance floor.  "Did you want to dance?" 

His smile for me was gentle and soft, the one he only gave to the people he genuinely liked.  "I guess we should."

The light pressure of his large hand on my waist and the warmth of the other in my own was reassuring, as Haru had taught me to dance formally three months earlier in preparation for this even. We glided around the floor smoothly, in the way only experienced partners could, but all the time I felt Momiji's eyes on us...

And he wasn't watching me.

After the music ended, Haru politely left me by the end of my table, refusing to get near my brother. The dance he had led me on was a good one, but the one he and Momiji were waltzing to was truly a masterwork of distrust and hurt.

I was sick of it  it was time someone did something, and since neither of the two lunk heads seemed inclined to make amended, that left me. It was partially my fault that the rift existed in the first place.

Well... If Tohru had managed to break Yuki and Kyou's sorrow, I was going to finish breaking my brother's - with the subtlety of a sledgehammer, if necessary. I had just about had it with both him and Haru, and they were about to be treated to what was going to be the third and hopefully final round of Black Momo.

I needed an accomplice though, and I needed that accomplice to be female. I glanced around the gathering. I needed a Jyunishi, and Kagura had vanished with Kyou and Kisa would be too shy, as close as she was to Haru. Process of elimination left me with Rin.

The idea made me uncomfortable. I respected the enigmatic woman, but I didn't understand her at all. She was contrary, and somehow managed to be the only one of the Jyunishi who disliked Yuki, which I hadn't believed possible. Even though Yuki was icy at times, he had such intense charisma that made you want him to love you. It was that way with the Mouse.

But Rin would help, because she loved Haru, and Haru loved her- just not in the way either of them wished. Their lives would have been easier if their love had been of the romantic kind. 

I made my way over to her, and she seemed to be waiting for me. Rin always seemed to have a sixth sense, a knowledge of what was to come. It was one of the reasons she made me uneasy.  "Hello, Momo-san," she said. Ever since I had learned the truth, she had used the formal honorific, rather than address me as a child.

"Konban wa, Rin-san," I replied softly.  "Can I ask you a favor?"

She blinked slowly, covering her fascinating green eyes. "Depends what the favor is."  That was another thing; she never agreed straight-out. She was untrusting.  

"Ask Haru to dance. Please?"

She studied me for a moment, taking in things about my soul I didn't know about myself before nodding slowly. "Just dance? One dance?"

"Keep him on the dance floor until..." I said, wondering, if Momiji would be cooperative or not. He might be in the middle of one of his bouncy fits and unable to focus, or one of his melancholy moods at seeing Tohru getting married but I hoped that he was still in his "Momo is my princess and I'll be her prince!" mode.

Rin didn't press. She nodded, and seemed thoughtful. "There's few men here I want to dance with, and Haru is the best of them," she assured me.

I smiled at her in relief.  "Thank you," I said.

"Go ask Momiji to dance. I'll keep Haru to the sides so no one interferes."

My smile widened as I realized she had predicted what I had in mind. It was an obvious plan, but sometimes the simply plans were best. There was less chance for things to go wrong.

Momiji had been too busy teasing Hiro in an attempt to get him to dance with Kisa to see me talking to Rin, and readily accepted when I asked him to dance. It was a bit awkward, really, because he placed his hands on my hips instead of around my back as a precaution, a step away from the intimacy I knew he craved. I leaned against Momiji's chest. I had learned, through trial and error, just how much contact I could have with a Jyunishi without triggering a change. 

Momiji was quiet as we danced, seeming to be lost in his own thoughts and not really paying attention. I had grown accustomed to his odd silences, and was relieved for this one. It made it easier for what I planned. Out of the corner of my eye, I watched as Rin maneuvered Haru onto the dance floor, and smiled. For once, one of my plans seemed to be working. 

It took about two minutes to be positioned right, and I wondered if I would have the nerve to actually do it. Rin and Haru were suddenly dancing next to us, and I looked at them nervously. I started to doubt myself.

I needn't have worried, because when my courage started to fail me, Rin's kicked in.

"Excuse me," she said, and suddenly Momiji and Haru were staring at each other.  "I'm cutting in."

Momiji's hands fell away from me obediently as he turned to Rin, obviously thinking she meant to let me dance with Haru again, but she grabbed me instead, somehow forcing Momiji into Haru's arms.  "Have fun," she said, before dragging me off.

Rin wrapped her arms around my waist, apparently unconcerned that she was dancing with another woman. That was her; Rin wasn't bothered by social norms. "Do you think that was a good idea?" she asked me. Her eyes shifted over to where Momiji was locked in Haru's arms, apparently unable to move through shock.

"Probably not," I replied. "But they need to start looking at each other." I laughed a bit as Rin swung me around in a dizzying spiral. "Besides, when Haru goes Black, we'll just blame it on me being a child."

She quirked an eyebrow at me in amusement. "You're too clever by half," she said. She leaned in closer, and I was surprised that she was wearing a light raspberry scent; I had figured her the type to wear something more exotic like jasmine or a musk. "Don't change, little one," she said, and then she spun me away from her.

I was whirling like a dervish, wondering who would catch me, but sly Rin had planned it well. Shigure's hands caught mine, and I saw the imp of mischief that was so much a part of him dancing in his eyes even as he pulled me into a waltz that was against the tempo. Dancing to our own beat, we swung into wild movements.

"Well... Now what are you going to do?" he asked me, and there was something in his eyes that made me wish I was ten years older.

"Hmmm?" I replied innocently.

He slowed down after a moment before staring into my eyes. "You've done what you've had to. Look at your brother, Momo-chan..." he said, and he led me to the edge of the dance floor, though his arm was still on my waist, making it clear to others that I was his partner still.

I studied Momiji, who seemed to have relaxed. The third song since Rin and I had pulled our swap was beginning, and he still hadn't left Haru. The tension in his body had faded from him, and he seemed to actually be speaking. Then I noticed him gesture elaborately with his right hand, and Haru smiled indulgently.

"They're doing well," I said softly. "They might make it."

"They will," Shigure assured me. "Because it's what we all hope for, and it's what they dream of. They need each other; they belong together. But what does that leave for Sohma Momo?" Shigure asked.

I blinked at him. "Well... It leaves me where I always was. As Momiji's sister."

Shigure blinked. "What does that mean? If he finds happiness with Haru, that means you can't build your life around him. He's spent the last year of his life focusing solely on you. And..."

"I'm a teenager. I expect the world to revolve around me," I said practically. "But in the end, I wouldn't want to be just Momiji's sister. I have him, and if he has Haru, I'm happy. Because... When I grow up, I want to find that special someone who looks at me the way Haru looks at him... Or the way Yuki looks at Tohru. There's more than one type of love, and I don't want to be loved like a sister for the rest of my life."

Shigure tilted his head. "But... Can your family give it to you?"

"Sohmas often intermarry, and from what I understand, I don't have any first cousins, so everyone is fair game," I said slyly, flirting my eyelashes. "Besides, don't you like high school girls?"

"Momo-chan! I'm old enough to be your father!" Shigure sputtered.  It was the first time I ever saw him look flustered, and I knew it would go into my most cherished memories.  

I couldn't contain the laughter that burbled out of me.  "I'm teasing, Shigure-niisan!" I assured him. "But... There's hundreds of Sohmas. Just because I know of the curse doesn't mean I have to marry one of you. Hiro loves Kisa, and no one else isn't taken."

He blinked. "Well, there's always Ritsu...."

I shuddered. I would walk all over Ritsu. It wouldn't be a healthy relationship for either of us. "Um..."

Shigure laughed at me, before leaning in to brush a kiss across my forehead, the way Momiji so often did. "You're a treasure, Momo-chan. Don't limit yourself just to us... Though we'd be fools to let you escape."

I nodded playfully. "Well, I'm not quite fifteen. I can't make my mind up yet on anything! Life's short, why not live it?"

Shigure's smile was beautiful as he took my hand. "Indeed. And if you keep it up, I may forget how young you are." He winked at me playfully before dragging me back out to dance. I glanced around, but Momiji and Haru had vanished, and I hoped they were finally talking. It would take them a while to rebuild their relationship, and longer still to come to an understanding about where they needed to head, but I had faith in them.

Shigure's hand was warm on my waist as he swept me around, playfully teasing me. That fluttery feeling built inside me, and I decided that I was going to let myself indulge in my first full-blown crush. A crush on someone that much older should be safe, after all. If Shigure ever tried anything, Haru and my brother would make him miserable, and I was willing to bet Ayame, Kyou and Yuki would have a few choice words. 

Still, I decided it would be my secret - a normal schoolgirl crush on a man she could never have. For once, a Sohma secret would be of the normal variety, a love that wouldn't hurt anyone, but was of the kind you encountered as you grew up. I was a teenager, and I was in love, and I had a secret.

And wasn't that what life was suppose to be about?

END OF SECRETS OF THE SOHMA

Author's Narcissistic Ramblings:

What a long, strange road it's been. This was begun before Momo was recognized in the more recent manga chapters of Furuba, so it stands now as an AU.

Yes, there's some plot ends which aren't tied up. What did Akito do to Momiji? Momo's anger at her father is not dealt with appropriately as he is turned into a whipping boy. Momo's mother still got off. But remember... 1POV. We only know what Momo does... and she's fourteen. Momo's characterization is based on many young teens  I know – too smart for their own good, but with no wisdom to really understand what they're doing. Yeah, I was that way at thirteen, and I'm still that way at twenty-three. 

Don't you love first person POV?


End file.
